Washington Nature Guide: April 2026
April is the famous tulip month of the Skagit Valley and a tide of spring migration across Washington — warblers and shorebirds pour through, camas turns the prairies blue, and the lowland gardens hit their fullest planting stride before the mountains have begun to thaw.
What to look for this week
- The Skagit flats roar with tens of thousands of wintering Snow Geese, Trumpeter and Tundra Swans, and Bald Eagles line the rivers below the salmon spawn.
- The Quadrantid meteor shower peaks in a brief, sharp burst around January 3 — watch the dark northeast after midnight from the dry country east of the Cascades.
- In the mild Puget lowland, keep harvesting overwintered kale, leeks, and parsnips between rains, and prune dormant apples and roses on a dry day.
- Western hemlock, redcedar, and Douglas-fir carry the gray westside landscape, their trunks furred with moss in the wettest weeks of the year.
Birds This Month
April is migration in full swing. Songbirds pour back into Washington — Yellow-rumped, Orange-crowned, and the first Yellow and Wilson's Warblers, Western Tanagers, Black-headed Grosbeaks, Warbling Vireos, and Pacific-slope Flycatchers filter into the leafing forests. Swallows of every species hawk over the wetlands, and Rufous Hummingbirds are now widespread and feisty.
The shorebird show is on. Grays Harbor and Bowerman Basin become one of the continent's great spring stopovers, hosting hundreds of thousands of Western Sandpipers, Dunlin, and Short-billed Dowitchers that swirl in clouds ahead of the Peregrine Falcons. The last wintering Snow Geese and swans leave the Skagit, where the tulip fields now draw the crowds. On the Salish Sea, Rhinoceros Auklets and Pigeon Guillemots are back at the seabird colonies and Brant feed on the eelgrass beds.
What's Blooming
April is Washington's peak cultivated-flower spectacle: the Skagit Valley tulip fields near Mount Vernon blaze in stripes of red, yellow, and pink, drawing visitors from across the country to RoozenGaarde and Tulip Town. In the wild, the south Puget prairies turn blue with common camas — the Mima Mounds and Glacial Heritage prairies near Olympia are at their best — laced with chocolate lily, shooting star, and spring gold.
Westside woods fill with native trillium, fawn lily, bleeding heart, wood violet, and the unfurling vanilla leaf. East of the Cascades, the shrub-steppe and Columbia Gorge peak in gold and blue — sweeping balsamroot and lupine, plus phlox, prairie star, and bitterroot on the dry slopes near Catherine Creek and the Dog Mountain trail. The high meadows of Rainier and the Olympics are still deep under snow.
Garden This Month
April is the peak planting month for the westside vegetable garden. Direct-sow carrots, beets, lettuce, chard, peas, radishes, scallions, and cilantro, plant potatoes, onion sets, and asparagus crowns, and set out hardened broccoli, cabbage, kale, and lettuce starts. Plant strawberries, blueberries, and cane berries, and tuck in summer-flowering perennials and dahlia tubers. Resist planting tomatoes, peppers, squash, and beans outside yet — Puget Sound soils stay cool and a late frost still threatens into mid-spring.
Keep slugs in check as the rain and new growth bring them out in force, a perennial westside battle. Feed and mulch the beds, and prune spring shrubs after bloom. East of the Cascades, the Columbia Basin garden is coming alive — sow cool-season crops and plant potatoes and onions, while starting tomatoes and peppers indoors for the short, hot summer to come, and guard against the still-frosty eastern nights.
Zone 6b (eastern valleys & foothills): the season opens after the snow. Sow peas, spinach, and radishes, plant potatoes and onions, and start warm-season crops indoors — but keep frost cloth ready, as freezes still reach the Columbia Basin valleys.
Zone 7b (Puget lowland & coastal valleys): the busiest month. Direct-sow carrots, beets, lettuce, chard, and peas, set out broccoli, cabbage, and lettuce starts, and plant potatoes. Hold tomatoes and squash a few more weeks — soils are still cool and the last frost can linger.
Zone 8a (Puget Sound shore & San Juan Islands): the mildest gardens push ahead — a full range of cool crops, early bush beans under cover late in the month, and hardened brassicas all go in. Watch clear nights for a stray frost.
What's at the Farmers Market
April markets fill with the first real green of the Northwest spring. Asparagus from the Columbia Basin and Walla Walla valley is the headliner — Washington is a major producer — alongside rhubarb, nettles, green garlic, overwintered leeks, and the first cut salad greens, spinach, and radishes from the westside. Storage apples are still crisp from controlled-atmosphere holding.
From the water come spring spot prawns, the last cold-water Pacific oysters, and razor clams when the coastal digs open. Choose asparagus with firm, tight tips and stand the spears upright in an inch of water in the fridge to keep them crisp; pick bright, firm rhubarb stalks and refrigerate them wrapped. The first farmers markets of the season are reopening across the state, from Olympia to Spokane, as the spring harvest builds.
Night Sky This Month
April's mild nights and clearer eastern skies bring out Washington stargazers. The premier dark-sky sites stay east of the Cascade crest — Goldendale Observatory State Park above the Columbia Gorge, Sun Lakes–Dry Falls in the coulee country, and the broad Methow and Columbia Basin horizons — while westside observers seize clear nights between spring fronts. Star parties begin reopening as the weather warms.
The spring sky is established: Leo rides high, the Big Dipper swings overhead, and its handle arcs to brilliant orange Arcturus in Boötes, with the dim galaxy fields of Virgo and Coma Berenices rewarding telescopes from a dark site. The Lyrid meteor shower peaks around April 22, radiating from the rising constellation Lyra. For this year's exact Lyrid timing, planet positions, and aurora outlook, see the printable Washington night-sky guide.
Butterflies & Pollinators
April brings Washington's butterfly season to life in the lowlands and the dry east. Westside gardens and woodland edges see Western Tiger Swallowtails beginning to fly, along with Spring Azures, Cabbage Whites, Sara Orangetips, Pale Tiger Swallowtails, and overwintered Mourning Cloaks and tortoiseshells still on the wing.
East of the Cascades the diversity is higher: Anise Swallowtails patrol the balds, Sara Orangetips and elfins work the warming slopes, and the first blues and skippers appear on the shrub-steppe flowers near the Columbia Gorge. Sagebrush Checkerspot and Becker's White emerge in the dry country. The Skagit camas prairies and Gorge wildflower slopes are prime butterfly habitat now. The high subalpine meadows of Rainier and the Olympics remain snowbound, their meadow specialties still two to three months from flight.
Trees This Month
April leafs out the Washington lowlands fully. Bigleaf maple and vine maple unfurl their bright new leaves over westside forests, red alder and black cottonwood green the riverbanks, and the sweet, balsamic scent of cottonwood resin drifts along the lowland rivers — a signature smell of the Northwest spring. The native Pacific dogwood begins to open its large white bracts in the forest, and cascara and Pacific crabapple leaf out.
Flowering is at its peak: Pacific madrone sets clusters of white urn-shaped flowers on the bluffs, and ornamental cherries and plums fill town streets. The conifers — Douglas-fir, western redcedar, western hemlock, and Sitka spruce — push soft new growth at their tips. East of the Cascades, the quaking aspen and riverside cottonwood green the canyons, and the ponderosa pine readies to shed pollen across the warming shrub-steppe.
Go deeper with the Washington guides
The complete Washington birding, native-plant, wildflower, and night-sky guides — or the whole year in one bundle.
Same month elsewhere: April in West Virginia · April in Wisconsin · April in Wyoming