The full moon shows its face on the earth about once a month. Well, kind of.
The full moon is usually not completely full. We always see the same side of the moon, but part of it is in shadow. Only when the moon, the earth and the sun are perfectly aligned is the moon 100% full, and the alignment produces a lunar eclipse.
And sometimes – once in a blue moon – the moon is full twice a month (or four times in a season, depending on which definition you prefer).
The next full moon will occur Monday 26 April at 23:31 EDT (03:31 UTC, 27 April), but the moon will appear full the previous evening and to its peak for the comfortable stargazer. April’s full moon, which will be one of the supermoons of this year, is sometimes known as the Pink Moon, although it has many other nicknames from different cultures.
Related: Night Sky, April 2021: What You Can See This Month
Orion GoScope II 70 Telescope Moon Kit: $ 84.99 by Amazon
If you know a youngster who can not get enough of the moon, they will rejoice at the view through the Orion GoScope II. This small telescope reveals craters and seas nearby, has a carrying case and moon map
When is the full moon? Calendar dates for 2021
This is when full moons will occur in 2021, according to NASA:
| Date | Name | American Eastern Time | UTC |
| January 28 | Wolf Moon | 14:16 | 19:16 |
| 27 Feb. | Snow Moon | 3:17 pm | 8:17 |
| March 28 | Wurmmaan | 14:48 | 18:48 |
| April 26 | Pink Moon | 23:31 | 3:31 (April 27) |
| May 26 | Flower Moon | 7:14 am | 11:14 |
| June 24 | Strawberry | 14:40 | 18:40 |
| July 23 | Buck Moon | 10:37 | 2:37 (July 24) |
| 22 Aug. | Sturgeon Moon | 8:02 am | 12:02 |
| 20 Sep. | Koringmaan | 7:55 am | 23:55 |
| 20 Oct. | Harvest moon | 10:57 am | 14:57 |
| 19 Nov. | Beaver Moon | 3:58 am | 8:58 |
| 18 Dec | Cold Moon | 23:36 | 4:36 (December 19) |
The full moon of 2021 is explained
Many cultures have given each month’s full moon different names. The names were applied to the entire month in which each took place. The Farmers’ Almanac name a number of names commonly used in the United States. There are some variations in the lunar names, but generally the same is used among the Algonquin tribes from New England in the west to the Lake Superior. European settlers followed their own customs and created some of their own names.
Other Native Americans had different names. In the book “This Day in North American Indian History” (Da Capo Press, 2002), author Phil Konstantin mentions more than 50 indigenous peoples and their names for full moons. He also mentions it on his website, AmericanIndian.net.
Amateur astronomer Keith Cooley has a short list of the lunar names of other cultures, including Chinese and Celtics, on his website. For example,
Chinese maaname:
| Month | Name | Month | Name |
| January | Holiday Moon | July | Hungry Ghost Moon |
| February | Budding moon | August | Harvest moon |
| March | Sleepy moon | September | Chrysanthemum |
| April | Peony | October | Friendly moon |
| May | Dragon Moon | November | Wit Maan |
| June | Lotus Moon | December | Bitter moon |
Full moon names often correspond to seasonal markers, so a Harvest Moon occurs at the end of the growing season, in September or October, and the Cold Moon occurs in the icy December. At least, that’s how it works in the Northern Hemisphere.
In the Southern Hemisphere, where the seasons change, the Harvest Moon takes place in March and the Cold Moon in June. According to Earthsky.org, these are common names for full moons south of the equator.
January: Hay Moon, Buck Moon, Thunder Moon, Mead Moon
February (mid summer): Graanmaan, Steurmaan, Rooi Maan, Wyrtmaan, Koringmaan, Hondmaan, Garsmaan
March: Oesmaan, koringmaan
April: Harvest Moon, Hunter’s Moon, Blood Moon
May: Hunter’s Moon, Beaver Moon, Frost Moon
June: Oak Moon, Cold Moon, Long Night’s Moon
July: Wolf Moon, Old Moon, Ice Moon
August: Snow Moon, Storm Moon, Hungry Moon, Wolf Moon
September: Worm moon, solid moon, crow moon, sugar moon, chaste moon, juice moon
October: Egg Moon, Fish Moon, Seed Moon, Pink Moon, Wake Moon
November: Maize Moon, Milk Moon, Flower Moon, Haas Moon
December: Strawberry Moon, Honey Moon, Rose Moon
Explain the phases of the moon with dates
The moon is a sphere that moves around the earth once every 27.3 days. It also takes about 27 days before the moon turns on its axis. So, the moon always shows us the same face; there is no single “dark side” of the moon. As the moon orbits the earth, it is illuminated by the sun from different angles – what we see when we look at the moon is reflected sunlight. On average, the moon rises every day about 50 minutes later, which means that it sometimes rises during daylight and other times at night.
At the new moon, the moon is between the earth and the sun, so that the side of the moon looking at us receives no direct sunlight and is illuminated only by the sunlight reflected by the earth.
A few days later, as the moon moves around the earth, the side we can see is gradually illuminated by direct sunlight. This thin disk is called the hazy crescent.
A week after the new moon, the moon is 90 degrees away from the sun in the sky and is half illuminated from our point of view – what we call first quarter, because it is about a quarter of the way around the earth.
A few days later the lighting area increases. It looks like more than half of the moon’s face is getting sunlight. This phase is called a fading moon.
When the moon has moved 180 degrees from its new lunar position, the sun, the earth and the moon form a line. The moon’s disk is as close as possible to the full illumination of the sun, hence it is called full moon.
Then the moon moves until it looks like more than half of its face is getting sunlight, but the amount decreases. This is the waning phase.
Days later, the moon moved a quarter of the earth around the third quarter. The sun’s light now shines on the other half of the moon’s visible face.
Then the moon moves in the waning crescent phase, as less than half of the face appears to receive sunlight, and the amount decreases.
Eventually, the moon moves back to the starting position of the new moon. Because the moon’s orbit is not exactly at the same level as the earth’s orbit around the sun, it is rarely perfectly aligned. Usually the moon goes from our vantage point above or below the sun, but sometimes it goes right in front of the sun, and we get the eclipse of the sun.
It is calculated that each full moon occurs at a precise moment, whether or not near the time the moon rises where you are. So when a full moon rises, it usually does so a few hours before or after the actual time when it is technically full, but a comfortable skywatcher will not notice the difference. In fact, for two consecutive nights around the full moon, the moon will look about the same.
Lunar eclipses of 2021
Lunar eclipses are inextricably linked to the full moon.
When the moon is in its full phase, it goes behind the earth with respect for the sun and can pass through the earth’s shadow and create a lunar eclipse. When the moon is completely inside the earth’s shadow, we see a total lunar eclipse. At other times, the moon passes only partially through the Earth’s shadow in a partial or even crescent moon eclipse (if the moon moves only through the outer region of the Earth’s shadow).
In 2021, there will be two lunar eclipses. A total lunar eclipse will occur on May 26, and a partial lunar eclipse will occur on November 19.
The total lunar eclipse of May 26 is only visible in parts of East Asia, Australia, the Pacific and North and South America. It starts at 04:47 EDT (0847 GMT) and ends at 09:49 EDT (1349 GMT).
The partial lunar eclipse of November 19 will be visible during the early morning hours in North and South America, Northern Europe, Eastern Asia, Australia and the Pacific Ocean. It starts at 01:02 EST (0602 GMT) and ends at 07:03 EST (1203 GMT).
Because the orbit of the moon is tilted around the earth, it does not align with the earth’s shadow every month and we do not have a lunar eclipse every month.
Solar eclipses of 2021
When the moon is in its ‘new’ phase, it goes between the earth and the sun, so that the side looking at the earth looks dark.
Sometimes the orbit of the moon aligns with the sun, so that part of the sun or the whole sun can be blocked by the moon. If the moon completely blocks the solar disk, we see a total solar eclipse during the day, which can be a wonderful place. Other times, the moon can only partially block the sun in a partial solar eclipse.
The moon can even create a “ring of fire” solar eclipse when it passes directly in front of the sun, but it is at a point in its orbit that is too far from the earth to completely cover the solar disk. It leaves a ring, or ‘ring’, around the moon to create an annular solar eclipse.
There will be two solar eclipses in 2021. An annular “ring of fire” will occur on June 10, 2021. It will be visible as a partial eclipse of regions of North America, Europe and Asia, with the ‘ring of fire’. effect visible from northern Canada, Greenland and Russia.
The total solar eclipse of 2021 will take place on December 4th. It will only be fully visible in Antarctica, with partial views visible from South Africa and the South Atlantic Ocean.