What to look for in nature in Hawaii this March

Yes, but the crowd is thinner every week. According to the sanctuary’s boating guide, the peak usually runs from January to March and the whole season from November to May, so a March whale is still very likely to be seen from a headland or a boat, only not as often as in February. The shore counts put numbers on the drop. In 2026 the Sanctuary Ocean Count logged 1,954 whales in January and 1,935 in February, and then 436 in March, which the sanctuary’s summary put at 77.7 percent below January. It said the low March total reflected whales returning to their feeding grounds in Alaska, and also named Kona low storms that month as a reason for poor viewing.

That second reason matters when you read any single March number. The table gives the final count of each of the last four seasons. The 2023 count, on a clear and calm morning, found more than twice as many whales as the 2026 count, which was held in strong wind and whitecaps. Both facts are true at once: fewer whales are around in late March, and rough water hides many of those that remain.

Three of Hawaii’s burrow and ground nesters are busy at once. The newest arrivals are the ʻuaʻu kani, or wedge-tailed shearwaters. The Kauaʻi refuges’ own website says they come back to the Kīlauea Point area around mid-March, reunite with mates, claim burrows under rocks and vegetation, and then wait until June to lay a single egg; the chick hatches in August. Their name means “moaning petrel,” and the refuge notes that they are most active in twilight.

Two other seabirds are already well into their year. Mōlī, the Laysan albatross, lay in November and December and their chicks do not fly until July, according to the state wildlife division, so March falls in the middle of the chick months. And on Haleakalā, ʻuaʻu, the Hawaiian petrels, are back on the summit slopes, where the park says they are present from February through November.

Dogs and cats are the shearwaters’ worst enemies near the coast. The Kauaʻi refuges’ site asks visitors to keep dogs leashed, cats indoors and not to feed feral cats. Kīlauea Point National Wildlife Refuge itself was closed to the public in early October 2026 for hurricane repairs and lighthouse restoration; when it reopens, visits will be by reservation on Recreation.gov, so check its page before you plan around it.

March is when the eggs start to appear. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says ʻio pairs build their nests in spring, that egg-laying typically begins in March, and that the eggs hatch by July after about 38 days of incubation shared by both parents. The Service says males perform elaborate aerial acrobatics from winter into spring and that these displays can be seen from the ground. The ʻio is a hawk found nowhere in the wild except Hawaiʻi Island, where it holds some 2,372 square miles, about 58.7 percent of the island, in both native ʻōhiʻa forest and farm country. It has been federally listed as endangered since 1967, and the Service describes the population as low but relatively stable.

A few, at the tail end of the season. The state wildlife division says nēnē may nest in any month except May, June and July, though most nesting happens from October to March, and clutches are usually laid from October through December. An egg hatches after about 30 days, the goslings can feed themselves almost at once, and young birds stay close to their parents for as long as a year, so families with young are still a possible sight in March.

Once down to about 30 birds in the 1950s, the nēnē now numbers several thousand in the wild. In 2019 the federal government moved it from endangered to threatened, but it remains endangered under state law. It lives on four islands, Hawaiʻi, Maui, Kauaʻi and Molokaʻi, from sea level to 7,800 feet.

Both: the nesters are just beginning and the visitors have not quite gone. DLNR says the aeʻo, or Hawaiian stilt, nests from March to August, with a peak in May and June. At Keālia Pond on Maui, the refuge says the season begins when the water level in the ponds drops and exposes mudflats, usually in late March or early April. The birds then lay four brown-speckled eggs and sit on them for about 24 days. The ʻalae keʻokeʻo, the Hawaiian coot, prefers deeper water for its breeding season, which the refuge puts at December to March, so its nesting is mostly finished.

The same ponds hold more than thirty species of waterfowl and shorebirds in winter, some arriving from Alaska, Canada and occasionally Asia. The refuge calls August to April the best time to see them, which makes March one of the last good months.

They are putting on their breeding plumage. Through the winter, kōlea, Pacific golden plovers, are speckled brown and gold, easy to overlook on a grass verge. As spring comes they molt into a startling look, with a black belly, face and throat outlined in bright white, and then they leave for Alaska. The Kōlea Count places the departure in April and May.

Hawaiʻi Audubon’s Kōlea Count project divides the year into three watching periods: arrival from July 1 to November 30, winter counts from December 1 to March 31, and departure in April and May. March is therefore the last month of the winter count, and the project asks for the date each bird leaves and where birds gather before they go.

Pups are born in every month, but DLNR says March through August is when most of them arrive. In the main islands, 34 pups were born in 2024. NOAA Fisheries puts the main-island population at about 400 seals, out of roughly 1,600 in the whole species. A mother stays on the beach and nurses her pup for five to seven weeks, and she can be protective of it.

The state’s advice for pups is to give a mother and pup at least 150 feet on land and in the water. NOAA’s general rule of thumb for any resting seal is 50 feet. When you cannot tell if a seal has a pup, use the greater distance.

It is the back half of it. The Western Regional Climate Center reports that below 2,000 feet winter brings the most rain, and the totals fall off as summer approaches. Over the same stretch the trade winds are getting steadier: the center puts their frequency at 50 to 80 percent from October through April and at 80 to 95 percent from May to September. March therefore swings between two moods, a breezy trade-wind day with showers on the windward side and a wet, muggy spell when a low pushes in from the west.

The table gives an average March at eight stations. The gap between windward Hilo and leeward Keāhole is the whole story of Hawaii’s climate in two numbers. Hilo gets about 12.7 inches of rain on 14.9 days, while Keāhole, on the opposite Kona side of the island, gets less than an inch. For the weather as it happens, see how to read the forecast and the sky.

For the seasonal outlook, go to the Climate Prediction Center’s 90-day page, which is refreshed about the middle of every month. This guide does not forecast the season.

About 37 minutes across the month in Honolulu. The March equinox arrives on Saturday, March 20, at 10:25 a.m. Hawaii time, when day and night are nearly equal across the world. The Naval Observatory’s Honolulu tables give sunrise at 6:52 a.m. and sunset at 6:36 p.m. on March 1, and 6:25 a.m. and 6:46 p.m. on March 31. For daylight at any other town, try our day-length page.

Hawaii does not change its clocks, so sunrise and sunset glide smoothly all month while most of the mainland loses an hour of sleep on Sunday, March 14, the second Sunday of the month. The only change here is in the time difference. From March 14 until the first Sunday of November, Honolulu is six hours behind New York and three behind California, instead of five and two. Check that before you watch any live event or phone a mainland office.

All times are Hawaii Standard Time, which does not change. Moonless evenings, the best for faint objects, cluster from about March 3 to 12, around the new moon late on Sunday, March 7. Two bright planets, Jupiter and Mars, are high in the evening sky in or near the constellation Leo, Venus and Mercury sit in the east before dawn, and the Worm Moon rises full on March 21.

For the phases of any month, see our moon page, and for what the clouds will do on a clear-sky night, our cloud guide.

1. Count whales on Saturday, March 27. Four hours from 8 a.m. Register through the Pacific Whale Foundation for Maui or at oceancount.org for the other islands.
2. Follow a kōlea. Choose one bird, photograph it each week, and report its last day to the Kōlea Count in April or May.
3. Listen for shearwaters at dusk beside a coastal trail, and keep the dog on a leash.
4. Walk the Keālia boardwalk on Maui and look for stilts at the pond’s edge. The visitor center is open on the first Saturday of the month, March 6.
5. Look for monk seal pups, from 150 feet, and call the hotline at 888-256-9840 if you see a new one.
6. Spot Jupiter and Mars high in Leo after dark, and find the Worm Moon rising on the evening of March 21.

Tallies, sketches and dates all fit in a Naturalist’s Field Journal, and our nature guides cover every state, month by month. For the month before this one, see Hawaii in February.

• Hunting and blaze orange. DLNR’s Lānaʻi axis deer announcement for 2027 schedules a youth hunt on March 5 to 7, a muzzleloader hunt on March 12 to 14, and a rifle hunt held over eleven consecutive weekends, Friday through Sunday, from March 19 to May 30, all in Hunting Units 1 and 2. Participation is by lottery, and DLNR says the hunts may be changed or cancelled at any time. Wherever firearms are allowed, the state’s game bird rules require a hunter, a guide or anyone accompanying one to wear an outer garment of solid blaze orange (or orange mesh with openings no larger than an eighth of an inch), visible from front and back even with a pack. Orange camouflage is not allowed. The same rule exempts spring turkey hunting and designated archery areas. If you hike on a weekend, wear something bright.
• A holiday weekend. Friday, March 26, 2027 is both Prince Jonah Kūhiō Kalanianaʻole Day and Good Friday, a state holiday. DLNR’s posted rules open many hunting units on Saturdays, Sundays and state holidays, so expect hunters on that Friday as well.
• Spring turkey and dove. The rule chart on DLNR’s site, which dates from 2013, lists a spring turkey hunt on Hawaiʻi Island from March 1 to 31 at Kīpuka ʻĀinahou (archery only) and from March 1 to April 15 in Units A, F and G and on private land, and a special dove season on private land that ends on the last Sunday in March. No 2027 announcement was posted in early October. Confirm all dates and permits with DLNR’s Hawaiʻi Island office at 808-974-4221.
• Closures. The hunting announcements page carried an April 2026 caution about closed roads and animal control in Kalalau Valley on Kauaʻi, and Kīlauea Point refuge was closed in October 2026. Check each before you go.
• Flash floods. Streams can swell in minutes from rain that fell miles uphill, so stay out of channels when it rains, and do not wade across fast water.
• Winter surf. The state’s ocean safety office lists November through April as the winter season, with extremely high surf at many north and west shores. Swim at guarded beaches and watch waves from high ground.
• Volcanic gases. Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park warns that hazardous gases can affect sensitive people; check the air-quality information before you go. Parking lots there tend to fill by 10 a.m.