The Moon
The Moon In August
We’re barreling towards a new moon on the fourth as August begins, meaning dark nights are in ready supply.
The first quarter moon is visible on the 12th, presenting us with some of the best lunar viewing in the evening for August. Our neighbor continues to brighten towards full on the 19th, meaning fainter DSOs are out of reach for us at that time.
The second half of the month brings darker evening skies as the moon doesn’t rise until after midnight for the last week. If you’re a happy moon-gazer, then give its last quarter view a try as the end of the month approaches, but set your alarm clock for an early morning.
Librations this month are not particularly impressive. The best of the bunch is in the 19th, when more of the Moon’s southeastern flank will be on show than normal.
Moon Name
August’s full moon is known as the Sturgeon Moon because it’s when North American tribes noticed a boom in the number of these fish appearing in their Great Lakes hunting grounds at this time of year. This year we will see the Strawberry Moon on the evening of August 19th, within the constellation Aquarius.
In different cultures and religions, it can also be known as the Flying Up Moon (birds leaving the nest) or the Corn Moon, associated with ripening fields that we see as summer comes to its peak.
Viewing Summary
| Dark Evenings | Dark Mornings | Dark Night | Evening Moon | Morning Moon | Librations |
| 1-4, 25-31 | 2-14, 31 | 1-6, 29-31 | 10-20 | 18-28 | 7, 8, 19, 20 |
Moon Phases, Rise & Set Times
Whether you are planning to observe the moon, or you want to make sure to avoid it, use the table below to discover when the moon will be above the horizon this month. The ‘Illumination’ column shows how bright it is going to be – the higher the %, the brighter the moon.
Moon Table Notes
- A=Apogee (furthest approach), P=Perigee (closest approach), FQ=First Quarter, LQ=Last Quarter
- All times are for Kansas City (DST). However, these times will be approximately accurate for your local time zone wherever you are in the northern hemisphere. For example, if you live in London, UK, the moonrise and set times will be no more than an hour different from those shown in the table above.
- There are two moonrise columns in the table, this is because each day is timed from midnight to midnight. On some days in the month the moon is already in the sky at midnight, therefore it sets first before rising again later in the day. On other days, the moon is below the horizon at midnight. On those days it rises first before setting later in the day.
- The data in the table comes from timeanddate.com
Visualization Of The Moon’s Impact
The following chart shows a visualisation of when the moon is above the horizon and below. This should make it easier for you to plan which nights offer the darkest skies and which provide the best opportunity for observing the moon itself.
First & Last Quarter Moon Locations
The two pictures below, from SkySafari 6, show the last and first quarter moons available to us in June.
We’ll see it reach first quarter on 12 August, when the moon will be passing through Libra. First quarter is always best viewed in the evening, when the moon is higher in the sky. The image below shows the moon’s location at 10:00 pm when it will be 17° over the southwestern horizon.
Last quarter, which is better for lunar gazers outside in the morning, happens on the 26th of August. The second star chart below reveals that the moon is in Taurus that night, very close to the Pleiades, and 60° above the eastern horizon at 5:00 am.
Click on the pictures for full screen versions.
Librations
The moon wobbles as it orbits Earth. These wobbles are known as librations and they show us parts of the Moon’s surface which are usually on the ‘dark side’. This means that we can actually see around 59% of the lunar surface over the course of a month. Keen moon watchers look for these librations so they can spy craters not normally visible to us.
The best librations for August occur on the 7th, 8th, 19th, and 20th of the month. Most of these are unremarkable but we’ll see more of the moon’s southeastern edge than usual on the night of the 19th. Learn more about librations here on Love the Night Sky (opens a new tab).
More information on how to read the images is provided at the bottom of this page.
Guide to libration images
Where the two blue lines cross shows the center of the lunar surface when there is no libration. The blue dot shows the center of the Moon’s surface, i.e. where the Earth would appear overhead if you were standing on the lunar surface. The yellow dot (cone) shows where the Sun is overhead.
Use the images above to see where each libration occurs this month and how large it is. Firstly, imagine a line running from the crossed blue lines and through the center of the blue dot. Extend this line on to the edge of the Moon’s surface. Where the line meets the edge is where the libration is most noticeable, this is shown as a red arrowhead in the diagram on the right.
Secondly, to see how large the libration is, note the distance between the crossed blue lines and and the blue dot. This is shown as the double-headed green arrow in the diagram. The larger this distance, the more of the ‘dark side’ of the Moon we can see.
The images above are generated on this NASA website.
