January

• Mountain goats come down to lower elevations as the snows become heavy. A good place to spot them is the cliffs along the Baker River Trail.

• Elk also move to lower elevations.

• With snow carpeting the ground near the mountains, it's a good time to find animal tracks, including elk, snowshoe hare, cougar and bobcat.

• Truffles are abundant in the woods. These fungi stay below the surface, releasing pungent fragrances that entice animals to eat them, passing on the spores.

• Great horned owls start their deep, hooting mating calls.

• Coho run in Thompson and Boyd creeks.

• Late January: Sea water is at its clearest, with less plankton than at any other time of year.

February

• Barred owls start their mating calls.

• Skunk cabbage blooms, heating up the soil around it as it does so. The heat disperses the plant's aroma, a mixture of decay and dung, attracting insects.

• Late February: Bull kelp anchors to the sea floor, as deep as 30 feet down, and begins growing.

• Alder catkins release pollen.

• Indian plum blooms.

• Tree swallows arrive, among the first birds to migrate north for the summer.

• Any night after heavy rain with a temperature over 50 degrees will see adult salamanders and frogs migrating toward breeding grounds.

March

• If you walk close to a pond at the beginning of the month, you might hear a low murmuring sound. It's male red-legged frogs calling beneath the water for mates.

• Red-flowering currant blooms.

• Silver-spotted tiger moth caterpillars, which hatched in the fall and spent the winter huddled together in Douglas fir trees, begin to spread out.

• Crustaceans, fish, mollusks and other sea creatures release thousands of tiny larvae into the plankton through March and April.

• Ladybugs come out of hibernation.

• Brant that winter in Mexico stop at Padilla Bay.

• Great blue herons move to colonies.

• Mid-March: Violet-green swallows and rufous hummingbirds arrive.

• Tree frogs start their chorus.

April

• Trillium blooms.

• April 8 is the average date for the last frost of the year.

• Mid-April: Barn swallows and yellow warblers arrive.

• First bats emerge from hibernation.

• Rough-legged hawks leave for their breeding grounds in the Arctic.

• Morels appear and oyster mushrooms fruit on hardwoods now through May.

• Big-leaf maples bloom.

• Camas blooms in low-lying meadows.

• Spawning time for Cherry Point herring begins.

• Gray whales migrate along the Washington coast on their way from Baja California to their summer feeding areas around the Bering Strait.

• Snow geese leave by the end of the month.

• River flows rise as snow starts melting. If heavy rains fall on the melting snow, floods could result.

• This year's bull kelp reaches the water's surface.

• In April and May, plankton is at its thickest in seawater.

May

• Early May: Dunlin fly north.

• Bears come out of hibernation

• Wood ducks and mallards fledge.

• After a flightless winter, western grebes take flight again, getting in shape for migration. A week later, they leave for the interior.

• Mid-May: The western tanager, easily the most striking of our songbirds, arrives. It is particularly drawn to cherry trees.

• Pond lily blooms.

• Pacific forktail damselflies, the first damselflies of the year, emerge from ponds and lakes.

• Amphibian egg masses appear in ponds.

• Brant leave for their breeding grounds in the Arctic.

• Southern resident orcas arrive in the area.

• Steelhead and sea-run cutthroat trout run in Thompson and Boyd creeks.

• Cottonwoods begin to release their fluffy seeds.

• Stinging nettles bloom.

• Late May: Mountain goats begin to have kids and continue through early June.

June

• High summer in the bird world; all the summer birds have arrived from the tropics and the winter migrants all have left. This lasts at least until the end of the month, when western sandpipers stop at the coast on their way south.

• First mosquitoes appear.

• Serviceberries, wild strawberries, thimbleberries, and red huckleberries fruit.

• Steelhead and sea-run cutthroat trout run in Thompson and Boyd creeks.

• Snow melts in the mountains late in the month. As it melts, glacier lilies bloom.

• Late June, Indian pipe, and other pale, parasitic plants emerge from woodland soils.

July

• Toadlets of Western Toad emerge from the water. Don't touch; they're fragile. Places to see them: Silver Lake on the July 4 weekend. Hannegan Pass Trail, Yellow Aster Butte Trail, Elbow Lake Trail.

• Wild flowers are abundant in mountain meadows.

• Butterflies congregate on Yellow Aster Butte and other lower Cascade peaks

• Harbor seals pup.

• Big leaf maples form seeds.

August

• Rufous hummingbirds move from lowlands to subalpine meadows.

• Paintbrush blooms in mountain meadows.

• Perseid meteor shower peaks August 12.

• Mid-August: Giant dampwood termites swarm and fly. Often wrongly called flying ants, these red insects are clumsy fliers, often bumping into people's hair.

• Lion's mane jellyfish booms in population.

• Late August: Locally breeding eagles fledge.

• At end of month, yellow-jackets reach peak aggression.

• In odd years, pinks run in Whatcom Creek, Boyd Creek and the Nooksack River.

• Chinook run in Boyd Creek.

• Rivers reach their lowest flows.

September

• Blueberries fruit in the mountains.

• Bears are on the move through mountain meadows, eating blueberries.

• Mid-September western grebes arrive for the winter. Once here, they lose the ability to fly, and swim around local waters, fishing.

• Orb-weaving spiders reach peak size and mate.

• Southern resident orcas leave at the end of the month.

• In odd years, pinks run in Whatcom Creek, Boyd Creek, Glacier Creek and the Nooksack River.

• Chinook run in Boyd Creek.

• Two weeks after the first thorough rain of fall, mushrooms sprout up, including chanterelles and boletes.

• Subalpine daisy blooms, bringing to an end the flowering season above the tree line.

October

• Douglas fir cones open, releasing seeds to the wind.

• Fall colors are at their most brilliant in the mountains.

• Early in the month, see migrating birds of prey riding thermals near ridge tops.

• Bulk of dunlin arrive.

• Rough-legged hawks arrive from the Arctic, along with a variety of hawks and owls wintering in this area.

• Elk rut. This time of year, elk bulls often bugle.

• Mid-October: Snow geese arrive.

• Gray whales migrate south again.

• First frost by end of month.

• Gray-bellied brant arrive at Padilla Bay around Oct. 31.

• Chinook, coho and chum begin running on Whatcom Creek, coho and chum run at Chuckanut Creek, coho run at Thompson and Boyd creeks.

• First major snow in the mountains falls by the end of the month.

• When big leaf maples lose their leaves, the mosses and licorice ferns on their branches start growing.

November

• Mosses mate, their sperm swimming through rainwater. Their spore bodies will form over the winter.

• Flooding common on warm wet days this month, when heavy rain falls on melting snow.

• Trumpeter swans arrive early in month.

• Every few years, snowy owls fly south to winter here.

• Varied thrushes appear in habited parts of the lowlands mid-November.

• Hedgehog and Matsutake mushrooms fruit.

• Chinook, coho, and chum run in Whatcom Creek; coho and chum run in the Nooksack River, Chuckanut and Squalicum creeks; chum run in Padden Creek, and coho run in Fishtrap, Thompson and Boyd creeks.

December

• Bears go into hibernation.

• All overwintering birds have arrived.

• Bald eagles congregate along the banks of the Nooksack and Skagit rivers, eating spawned salmon. They'll stay around, in diminishing numbers, until mid-February.

• Chinook, coho and chum run in Whatcom Creek; coho and chum run in the Nooksack River, Chuckanut, and Squalicum creeks, and coho run in Fishtrap, Thompson and Boyd creeks.

• With the cold weather at the end of the month comes the bright-red fruiting body of Sarcoscypha coccinea, the scarlet cup fungus, which grows on fallen hardwood branches.