Normally, September’s full moon is called the Harvest Moon. This year, though, because full moon comes so early in the month, the time of sunset and that of moonrise are still too far apart for it to be a “real” harvest moon. You see, in order for the moon to be helpful to farmers, who for centuries had no source of artificial light more friendly than lanterns, the time of sunset had to be fairly close to the time of moonrise. So a true harvest moon requires moonrise to be within 15-30 minutes of sunset. Otherwise, it’s just a September moon (not necessarily a September Morn).
Another way of saying this is that the Harvest Moon is the closest full moon to the September equinox. Practically speaking, that means it can occur anywhere from September 8 to October 7 or thereabouts, although it can occur even later into October. Next month, on October 4, we’ll have a real Harvest Moon.
This is just our regular calendar, so it’s not too complicated. But as we know, the moon has a powerful influence on the tides. And when you add in the moon, the sun, the calendar, and an outdoorsman’s penchant for trying to figure out when to go where, we get the solunar calendar. How’s that for complicated?
[UPDATE: So, what was the full moon in September called? Well, there are two options, depending on whether you like the Farmer’s Almanac/NASA names, or the neopagan names. For you techies and almanac-heads, it’s the Sturgeon Moon; for you neopagans, it’s the Corn Moon. NASA has a pretty good Q&A site about the full moon names here.]
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