What to look for in nature in Mississippi this December

When do snow geese and the big duck flocks fill the Mississippi Delta?

• The December flight

  Mid-December; the 2025 survey flew December 15 to 19 · The Delta from the Mississippi River east to the loess hills

  Last December the plane counted its way to an estimated 390,183 ducks, up from November but about 19 percent under the December long-term average. Mallards jumped to 92,947, the best December mallard figure since 2020, while gadwall and northern shovelers again led the other dabblers and scaup and ruddy ducks led the divers. Ice that week pushed ducks into deeper sloughs and oxbows or into tight packs that kept small holes open. The northeastern Delta, where the most flooded habitat was, held the most birds of every kind. Expect the 2026 report on MDWFP’s aerial survey page a few days after the flight.

• Light geese in the rice country

  Through December, building toward January · Harvested rice, soybean and corn fields, often near Delta refuges and catfish ponds

  A field of snow geese looks like a late snowfall until the whole sheet lifts at once. The “blue” birds are a dark color phase, not a separate species; the smaller white ones with short, stubby bills are Ross’s geese. White-fronted geese travel in smaller, browner flocks and give a laughing, high-pitched call. MDWFP’s December maps for 2025 placed light goose flocks across much of the Delta rather than in one or two spots, so a slow drive on Delta farm roads at first light has a fair chance of finding them. Nearly all of this is private farmland; birdwatch from the shoulder.

• Why water decides where the birds go

  All winter · Public impoundments and large private wetland complexes

  The 2024 and 2025 December reports both found Delta wetlands below average and many harvested fields disked, burying the waste grain ducks rely on. Birds massed on public impoundments and large managed private wetlands, and divers stuck to aquaculture ponds. With a drought fall behind it, the 2026 season will again depend on how much December rain the Delta catches and holds.

How do you join a Christmas Bird Count in Mississippi?

• Vicksburg and Jackson counts

  Vicksburg: Saturday, December 19, 2026. Jackson: Saturday, December 26, 2026 · Circles centered near Vicksburg and the Jackson metro

  Jackson Audubon Society lists both dates on its calendar, along with the compiler to contact for an assignment. In the 2024–25 season the Jackson circle found 102 species, a strong total for an inland count.

• A count at Leroy Percy State Park

  Saturday, December 26, 2026, about 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. · Leroy Percy State Park, west of Hollandale in Washington County

  MDWFP lists this Delta count on its events calendar and says birders of every skill level are welcome. Sign up through the compiler named on the park’s event listing before the day.

• The coast counts lead the state

  Dates are set each fall, mid-December to early January · Southern Hancock County and Jackson County circles

  Mississippi Coast Audubon Society runs both, and they are the state’s richest: in the 125th count Jackson County found 142 species and Southern Hancock County 141, the two highest totals in the state. The society says these long, all-weather days suit solid birders rather than first-timers, and it posts each year’s dates on its website and social pages.

• Noxubee and the hill counts

  Mid-December to early January · Sam D. Hamilton Noxubee National Wildlife Refuge, Tupelo, Grenada, Sardis Lake and others

  Noxubee’s circle found 113 species in the 125th count. For any other circle, Audubon’s online map shows its outline and how to reach the compiler.

Why are frogs calling in Mississippi in December?

• The dusky gopher frog

  Breeding usually December through March, after heavy rain · A few restored ponds in longleaf pine forest in south Mississippi, including Glen’s Pond on the De Soto National Forest in Harrison County

  This endangered frog survives in the wild only in Mississippi. The Fish and Wildlife Service’s recovery plan says the adults spend most of their lives underground in stump holes and small mammal burrows, and historically in gopher tortoise burrows, then travel to breeding ponds on the rains that come with passing cold fronts. The breeding call is a low, snoring croak. From its discovery in 1988 until 2004, Glen’s Pond held the only known population, and biologists have since restored more ponds and moved frogs to them. The ponds are few and fragile, so this is a frog to know about rather than go looking for; the best way to help is to support prescribed burning, which keeps longleaf forests open and the ponds sunny.

• Spring peepers and chorus frogs

  Warm, wet nights from late fall into early spring · Flooded ditches, woodland pools and wet pastures across most of the state

  The spring peeper is a small brown or orange frog with a dark X on its back. Its name fits poorly in the South: the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission calls it more of a “winter peeper,” breeding in winter and even autumn in the southern parts of its range, with the busiest choruses on rainy nights. In Mississippi, listen for it on mild, wet nights from late fall into early spring. The call is a clear, high “peep,” repeated slowly and evenly, and a ditch full of them carries a long way on a still night.

How do Mississippi animals get through the winter?

• Black bears in the den

  Females den first; cubs are born in January · The Delta bottoms, the loess bluffs of southwest Mississippi and the coastal counties

  MDWFP explains that black bears are not true hibernators. In their winter torpor, body temperature falls, metabolism drops by about half and the heart slows to 15 to 30 beats a minute. Pregnant females must den to give birth and go in first, followed by females with young and then solitary bears, with males last; some males stay in only a few weeks. Mississippi bears den for a shorter time and stay more active in winter than bears farther north, probably because food is easier to find. In flood-prone bottoms, dens are often hollows high in cypress or oak; on higher ground a bear may simply rake together a ground nest. Newborn cubs weigh about half a pound. If you find a den, leave quietly.

• Great horned owls already nesting

  Hooting on December nights; nesting begins in winter · Woodlots, farm edges, city parks and river bottoms statewide

  While most birds are simply getting by, great horned owls are starting families. Audubon’s field guide notes that they begin nesting very early and that their deep hoots carry through the woods on midwinter nights. They build almost nothing, taking over an old nest of a hawk, crow, heron or eagle, and lay two or three eggs that the female incubates for about four to five weeks. At dusk, listen for a pair hooting back and forth.

Which trees and plants stay green in Mississippi in winter?

• Southern magnolia, the state tree

  Evergreen all year · Rich woods and stream terraces, especially in the south; planted everywhere

  The magnolia is both Mississippi’s state tree and its state flower. In winter you notice the leaves: thick and leathery, 5 to 10 inches long, shiny above and rusty below. Look also for the cone-like seed pods, whose large red seeds dangle on silky threads when the pods open. Fallen magnolia leaves are tough and slow to rot, and they make good leaf rubbings.

• American holly and yaupon

  Berries through winter · Moist woods and fencerows statewide (holly); coastal plain thickets and yards (yaupon)

  American holly is the classic Christmas holly, a pyramid-shaped tree with spine-tipped, dull green leaves. Only female trees bear the red berries. Songbirds, game birds and mammals eat them, but they are poisonous to people, so keep them away from small children. Yaupon has small, round-toothed leaves without spines.

• Mistletoe and Spanish moss

  Easiest to see December to February · Mistletoe high in hardwoods such as oaks and hackberries; Spanish moss on live oaks and cypress, mostly in the southern half

  Those round green clumps in bare treetops are oak mistletoe, a semi-parasitic shrub with green, jointed stems that grows on the sunny branches of hardwoods. Spanish moss is neither a moss nor a parasite but an air plant that makes its own food and takes in water and minerals through tiny scales on its gray threads.

• Resurrection fern after rain

  Any wet spell; brown and curled in dry weather · Upper sides of live oak and other big hardwood limbs

  After the dry fall, many oak limbs are coated with what look like dead brown curls. LSU AgCenter notes that this harmless air plant can lose up to 97 percent of its moisture and still turn green again within hours of a good rain. Check one limb before and after a winter front to see the change.

• Longleaf pine and bare cypress

  All winter · Pine Belt and coastal uplands (longleaf); swamps, oxbows and the Natchez Trace’s Cypress Swamp (cypress)

  Longleaf carries the longest needles of any eastern pine, in bundles of three, and its seedlings spend years in a tufted “grass stage” near the ground. Bald cypress, though a conifer, sheds its needles each autumn, so in December a cypress swamp is all gray trunks and knees standing in dark water.

When is the earliest sunset in Mississippi, and how short is the shortest day?

What is December weather like in Mississippi, and could El Niño make it wetter?

What can you see in the night sky over Mississippi in December?

• The Geminid meteors

  Night of Sunday, December 13, into Monday the 14th · Anywhere dark; the radiant in Gemini rises in the east-northeast after dusk

  The IMO, the international body that tracks meteor showers, puts the Geminids’ theoretical best at 150 per hour, and in 2026 a slim crescent Moon is gone from the western sky around 9 p.m., so moonlight is no problem after that. Gemini climbs all evening, and counts are usually highest in the small hours, near 2 a.m. Real skies never reach that ideal, but from a dark spot in the Delta or a national forest you may still see a meteor every minute or two; from town, far fewer. Many are bright, unhurried streaks, a few tinged yellow or green.

• The solstice

  Monday, December 21, 2:50 p.m. CST · Watch where the Sun sets that evening: as far south on the horizon as it gets

  That instant marks astronomical winter: the Sun stands farthest south of the equator all year. Weather records treat the 1st of the month as winter’s start instead, grouping the three coldest months (December through February) as one season. Note the sunset spot from a fixed window and check it again in March.

• The Cold Moon, the year’s closest full moon

  Full at 7:28 p.m. Wednesday, December 23; nearly as full on Christmas Eve · Rising in the east-northeast near sunset

  This one is a supermoon: within a single night the Moon is both full and at perigee, its low point in a slightly oval orbit, so it shines a shade bigger and brighter over Mississippi than any other full moon this year. Watch it clear the treeline just after sunset, when it looks largest. On the 21st, two nights before, the gibbous Moon is near the Pleiades as the sky darkens.

• Planets: Saturn after dark, Venus before dawn

  All month · Saturn in the south and southwest in the evening; Venus low in the southeast before sunrise

  Saturn hangs in the southern sky at nightfall, unrivaled until the morning planets rise, and it sets a little sooner every week. Venus is a brilliant morning star, higher every morning this month; it swings farthest from the Sun (as we see it) on January 3. Before sunrise on the 4th, then the 5th, an old crescent Moon keeps company with Venus and the blue-white star Spica. Jupiter and Mars, both in Leo, rise before midnight and shine high in the south at dawn.

What can Mississippi families do outside in December 2026?

Safety notes for December in Mississippi