June’s Strawberry Summer Solstice Will Be Worse Than Usual

With the Strawberry Full Moon looming large on the southeastern horizon, June 21 will be the darkest Full Moon night of the year.

The Full Moon of June 2024 is the Strawberry Moon, and this year it coincides with the summer Solstice, which makes its appearance stranger – and darker – than usual. Read on to learn what’s going on with this year’s Strawberry Moon, how to get the best view, and how the Full Moon of June may also have given its name to a romantic tradition in the Middle Ages.

How and When to See the 2024 Strawberry Moon

June’s full moon will be brightest on June 21 at 9:08 PM EST, but will appear full in the sky from Thursday night through Sunday night, though it will be visible for several hours at night across much of the sky. continental United States Look very low – less than 30 degrees above the horizon – in the southeast sky after sunset, and the full Moon will be difficult to miss. The moon will only hang in the sky for a few hours before sinking below the horizon again, so don’t wait until late evening.

Is Strawberry Moon Red or Pink?

Despite the name, and despite many edited photos (of varying quality), Strawberry Moon is not red. Instead, the full Moon will appear a golden orange or yellow, as it often does when it is low on the horizon.

That’s because, at this angle, sunlight reflecting off the pale gray surface of the Moon must pass through the deepest part of Earth’s atmosphere to reach the irradiators on the ground. Along the way, the air scatters the relatively short wavelengths of blue light, so only longer wavelengths such as yellow, orange, and red get through (both yellow and orange colors prevent the Moon from appearing red). Sunsets have fiery colors for the same reason.

Because the atmosphere filters out most of the moonlight, this full Moon will appear brighter than usual.

Why is the Full Moon of June Called the Strawberry Moon?

The Algonquian and Ojibwe Native cultures nicknamed this Full Moon the Strawberry Moon because it marks the month when strawberries are ripe and ready to be picked in the northeastern United States. In Europe, people called it the Honey Moon, because June is also when honey is ready to harvest. .

“The tradition of calling the first month of marriage a ‘honeymoon’ may be associated with the new moon due to the custom of marrying in June,” wrote NASA’s Gordon Johnston in a blog post. “There doesn’t seem to be enough evidence to support 19^th A century-old theory that the word entered English as a result of the custom of gifting newlyweds mead for their first month of marriage.”

Why is the Strawberry Moon So Low in the Sky?

A full moon occurs when the side of the Moon that faces Earth is also fully pointed toward the Sun, and the entire surface of the Moon that we can see is lit up. So when the Moon is full, it is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun.

Meanwhile, June 20 is the 2024 Summer Solstice, the day the Earth’s North Pole is tilted toward the Sun. That makes the Sun appear further north in the sky than usual – and the Earth’s northerly orientation also makes the Sun appear longer in the sky at the Solstice. But the opposite is also true: The Moon, which is currently on the far side of the Earth, is farthest south on the night of June 20, and since the Earth’s northern hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun, it is also tilted away from the Moon. . The result, if you think of the sky as an observer of the universe, is that the full Moon does not stay in our sight for long this month.