What to look for in nature in Oregon this December

When do gray whales pass the Oregon coast in December?

• Winter Whale Watch Week

  Sunday, December 27 to Thursday, December 31, 2026 · Headlands and waysides from Astoria to Brookings; the Whale Watching Center in Depoe Bay

  Each winter, trained volunteers in the Whale Watching Spoken Here program stand at viewpoints along the whole coast to point out spouts and answer questions; the state parks department mentions 15 such sites. The program's own site, orwhalewatch.org, lists this year's week as December 27 to 31. Daily hours are set nearer the time, so check the list of stations before you drive. At the peak, the program says, roughly 30 whales an hour can pass the coast.

• The Whale Watching Center

  Wednesday to Sunday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. (current hours) · 119 S. Highway 101, Depoe Bay

  The state park center sits on the seawall above the tiny harbor, with big windows, binoculars and staff who log what they see. Call ahead (541-765-3304) for holiday hours. On a busy day ODFW notes that as many as 50 southbound whales have been counted from here during the winter watch week.

• How to find a blow

  Calm mornings with the sun behind you · Any high viewpoint over open ocean

  Scan the middle distance with bare eyes for a puff of white, then lift binoculars to the same spot. ODFW describes the gray whale's blow as a bushy column up to 15 feet tall that hangs for about five seconds; a whale typically breathes three to five times, half a minute or so apart, then dives for three to six minutes. In winter, a whale that keeps surfacing to your left is heading south.

Where can you see bald eagles and owls in Oregon in winter?

• The Klamath Basin's eagle winter

  Early December to mid-March; peak mid-February · Lower Klamath refuge, Township Road, Tule Lake, Klamath Wildlife Area at Miller Island

  The Klamath Basin Birding Trails say wintering bald eagles are present in impressive numbers from the start of December. Many spend the night in the roost at Bear Valley National Wildlife Refuge, and at first light they fly out to hunt over Lower Klamath and the flooded fields along Township and Lower Lake roads. Be in place by sunrise and watch for birds arriving at first light.

• Eagles on the salmon rivers

  Through December, wherever coho and chinook have spawned · Coos and Coquille tributaries, the Umpqua, the lower Rogue, Cascade foothill creeks

  Where spent salmon litter the gravel bars, look for adult eagles in the streamside alders and mottled brown young birds feeding on the bars below.

• Short-eared owls at dusk

  Late afternoon in open country · Marshes, wet pastures and grasslands, both sides of the Cascades

  ODFW counts it among Oregon's most conspicuous owls, because it hunts in daylight's last hour, flying low and floppy over fields like a big moth. Look for the pale buff face and a tawny flash on each wing. Its numbers in a given place vary a lot from year to year, following the voles it eats.

• Owls you hear before you see

  Long December nights · Forests statewide

  Oregon has 14 owl species. The northern saw-whet, only about eight inches long, is among the most common in the state's forests and the one heard most often on night surveys in the Coast Range; its call is a steady, repeated toot. A still, cold night after dark is the time to step out and listen.

How do I join a Christmas Bird Count in Oregon?

• Find your circle

  Dates posted through November and December · Statewide; listed by the Oregon Birding Association

  The Oregon Birding Association keeps the state's count list and updates it as compilers announce their dates. Last season's counts were spread over every weekend and many weekdays of the period, from the Columbia Estuary, Florence and Burns at the start to Oakridge and Prineville on New Year's Eve and a few in early January. Sign up early, since leaders assign areas in advance.

• The big ones

  One day each, late December · Portland, Eugene, Klamath Falls

  Portland's count is the largest in Oregon, and Eugene's is usually the second; Eugene also takes feeder counters who live inside its circle. On the east side, the Klamath Falls count typically leads both Oregon and Washington east of the Cascades, averaging more than 105 species.

• Counts in the high desert

  Mid-December · Burns, Malheur refuge, Hart Mountain, Summer Lake

  These remote counts need people willing to drive gravel roads in the cold. The organizers in Burns warn of anything from freezing fog to wind chills far below zero, so pack layers, waterproof boots, food and water, and treat the day as a winter expedition.

Are salmon still spawning in Oregon in December?

• Coos River coho

  Peak in December · West Fork Millicoma at the Millicoma Interpretive Center; Marlow Creek; State Forest Road 1000 above Allegany

  ODFW puts the Coos system's coho peak in December. The Millicoma Interpretive Center near Allegany is the easiest stop, and beyond it fish can sometimes be watched without leaving the car.

• Coquille River coho

  Late December into early January · LaVerne Park; the East Fork above China Creek; Steel, Middle and Moon creeks near Dora

  The Coquille's coho run a little later than the Coos fish. At Middle Creek, above the fish ladder about two miles upstream from the BLM's Middle Creek Recreation Site, spawning fish are visible from a vehicle; on Moon Creek they use gravel trapped behind logs that were placed to restore the stream.

• The tail of the Umpqua and Rogue runs

  Umpqua coho late November to early December; Rogue chinook to early January · Cow Creek, Deer Creek and Myrtle Creek; Bear Creek and the Rogue near Grants Pass

  The first week of December is the end of the window for Douglas County coho, and a few late fall chinook are still on the gravel in the Rogue Valley, where ODFW gives the season as early October through early January.

Where can you see elk in winter, and how do Oregon's animals get through it?

• Elk feeding tours at Jewell Meadows

  December through February, generally Thursday to Tuesday; reservations from December 1 at 8 a.m. · Jewell Meadows Wildlife Area, Clatsop County

  ODFW's guided winter feeding tours bring visitors close to the Roosevelt elk that use these meadows, up to 200 of them through winter and spring. The tours depend on staffing, the single phone line (503-755-2264) is busy on opening morning, and a parking permit is required. The same pastures also hold bald eagles, hawks, coyotes and the occasional bobcat.

• The Dean Creek herd

  All year; winter grazing in the pastures · Highway 38, about three miles east of Reedsport

  A resident herd of Roosevelt elk lives on the BLM's bottomland pastures here. The grass stays green through the mild coastal winter, and the elk are often in view from the highway pullouts.

• Black bears in their dens

  Most of the winter · Cascades west to the coast; the Blue and Wallowa mountains

  ODFW explains that black bears fatten through autumn, grow sluggish, then den under stumps, logs and root wads, in hollow trees or in holes dug into hillsides, and stay inactive through the cold months. Even so, keep garbage and bird seed secured through the winter, since a bear that wakes in a mild spell will look for food.

• Bats: migrate or hibernate

  Winter · Caves, mines, attics, bridges

  Oregon has 15 bat species. Some, such as the hoary bat, fly south for the winter; others stay and hibernate. The big brown bat copes with cold better than most and may fly on mild winter evenings. Never handle a grounded bat bare-handed; ODFW takes reports of sick or dead ones online.

How do you tell Oregon's evergreens apart in winter?

• Douglas-fir

  Cones on the ground all winter · Coast Range, Cascades and western valleys

  Look at a cone: it hangs down, and every thin scale has a three-tipped bract sticking out past it, which children like to say looks like mice diving headfirst into the cone. The soft needles grow all around the twig.

• Western hemlock and western redcedar

  All year · Moist west-side forests

  A hemlock's top leader droops over like a fishing rod, and its short, flat needles are of uneven lengths, with tiny cones. Redcedar has flat, scaly sprays rather than needles, a fruity smell when crushed and stringy, reddish bark that peels in long strips.

• Sitka spruce

  All year · The fog belt, within a few miles of the ocean

  Grab a spruce twig and it hurts: the needles are stiff and sharp-pointed, and each sits on a small woody peg that stays behind when the needle falls.

• Cutting your own tree

  Mid-November through December · National forests; Mt. Hood rules shown here

  The Mt. Hood National Forest sells Christmas tree permits for $5 a tree (plus a $2.50 service fee online at Recreation.gov), up to five per household. Trees may be no taller than 15 feet and must stand within 12 feet of another tree, you must cut low enough to leave no more than 6 inches of stump, and cutting is barred within 100 feet of a highway and in wilderness, recreation areas and active timber sales. Children in fourth grade can get a permit at no charge by showing their Every Kid Outdoors pass. Other Oregon national forests run similar programs; read each forest's guidelines before you go.

How much snow does Oregon get in December, and what will El Niño change?

• Snowshoe walks at Crater Lake

  Saturdays, Sundays and holidays from late November, 12:30 p.m., about two hours · Rim Village, Crater Lake National Park

  Rangers lead free walks on snowshoes, which the park lends; no experience is needed, but walkers must be at least 8 years old and must reserve a place by phone (541-594-3100). The vehicle entrance fee in winter is $20. The park says an average winter brings 42 feet of snow, and the walks are canceled in storms or when the snow is too thin.

• This winter's very strong El Niño

  Effects usually strongest December through February · Statewide

  In its September 10 update, NOAA's Climate Prediction Center put the probability that this winter's El Niño turns out very strong above nine in ten. Larry O'Neill, the state climatologist at Oregon State University, has said the usual El Niño signal in Oregon is warm and dry, but the three strongest events of recent decades left the state wetter than normal and very warm, with the snow line well up the mountains. KLCC's report pointed to the risks of a rainy, warm winter: landslides west of the Cascades, warm streams that stress spawning salmon, and trouble for the Dungeness crab fishery like that of 2015 and 2016. NOAA's official December-to-February outlook, issued October 15, is posted with the Climate Prediction Center's seasonal outlooks.

When are the December king tides on the Oregon coast?

When is Oregon's earliest sunset?

What is in the Oregon night sky in December?

• The Geminids

  Night of Sunday, December 13, into Monday, December 14 · Anywhere dark; the radiant is high in the south after midnight

  The International Meteor Organization ranks the Geminids as the year's richest shower, with a rate near 150 an hour in ideal conditions, and its predicted maximum falls around 6 a.m. Pacific time on the 14th, just before dawn here. A crescent moon, about a fifth lit, sets in Portland at 8:55 p.m. on the 13th, leaving darkness until dawn. Around 2 a.m. the radiant stands highest and the meteors come fastest. Real counts from a town will be far lower, and west of the Cascades the question is clouds, so watch the forecast and be ready to drive east or uphill.

• The Cold Moon, the closest of 2026

  Full at 5:28 p.m., Wednesday, December 23 · Rising in the northeast around sunset

  No full moon in 2026 looks bigger. Perigee, the moon's closest pass, follows in the early hours of Christmas Eve, so the disk coming up on the 23rd is a little larger and brighter than usual, and it still looks round when it rises again on the 24th.

• The solstice

  12:50 p.m., Monday, December 21 · Everywhere

  This is the instant the sun turns back north along the horizon; from here the days begin, very slowly, to lengthen. Go out at midday and mark the end of a fence post's shadow; repeat on the same date in June and compare.

• Planets

  All month · Venus in the southeast before dawn; Saturn in the southwest after dark

  Before sunrise, Venus blazes low in the southeast and gains height week by week, heading for its widest separation from the sun in the first days of January. Higher up in Leo shine Jupiter and dimmer, ruddy Mars; by Christmas, Jupiter rises around the middle of the evening. In the evening, ringed Saturn stands alone in the southwest, sinking a little earlier each night. Two pretty pairings: a slim crescent beside Venus and Spica at dawn on December 4 and 5, and an almost-full moon brushing past the Pleiades on the night of the 21st.

What can families do outdoors in Oregon in December?

What should I watch out for outdoors in Oregon in December?