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| Illustration of August's Sturgeon Moon, from Hal Borland's "Twelve Moons of the Year". |
According to Hal Borland’s “Twelve Moons of the Year”, the Native Americans called the August moon the “Sturgeon Moon”, possibly because these fish were “fat and prime about now, and right to catch and dry for winter.” Borland also says that, “Indians called it the Moon of the Green Corn…”, a time to feast on field corn. I prefer that name especially as I walk or drive by green fields of today’s tall sweet corn.
It’s also the month in which the moon comes closest to earth each year, on August 10 this year—and, it will be a full moon that night. I guess that means it’ll be the big orange August moon I have fond memories of seeing once while canoeing on a lake in northern Canada.
Unfortunately, I’ve read that this full moon will block out much of the annual Perseids meteor shower on the nights of August 11 to 13. Last year, I watched the shower in my yard and saw a shooting star about every two minutes,
Meteor Shower Watch
This year I might participate in a local group viewing at Honey Run Highlands Park (across from Honey Run Falls) from 11 p.m. Tuesday, August 12, to 1 a.m. Wednesday, August 13. An e-mail I got from the Brown Family Environmental Center at Kenyon College says that’s when the meteor shower peaks. It goes on to say, “We meet at the State Route 62 parking lot. The program begins with a night hike on the Prairie Trail to reach our viewing destination for the meteor shower watch. Bring a blanket and bag chairs! This event is weather and conditions dependent, with cancellation only in case of inclement weather. If overcast, we’ll enjoy a walk on the trails in the late hours of August 12th /wee morning hours of August 13th !” The event is sponsored by the Knox County Park District.
Borland has a short entry for each day of the year, so this is a book you can read daily forever. Although he wrote these entries in Connecticut from the 1940s to the 1970s, it still applies to much of what I see in rural Ohio today. For example, his entry for August 1 mentions “the first flower heads of joe-pye weed” and I’m seeing big clusters of the dark purple flowers along roads in Danville and in Apple Valley in Howard. He mentions “clouds of Queen Anne’s lace” and I see vacant lots in Apple Valley filled with those plants too. He says, “The night still twinkles with fireflies…”, but I have to admit I saw very few tonight in my yard, either because they’re winding down, or it was too cool tonight.
I did see a fantastic firefly show on a farm field in Danville recently, though, and I’ve had fair shows up to tonight in my yard.
He mentions grasshoppers in his August 3 entry and I’ve been seeing them hop and fly in the past few days. I don’t think I’ve seen the goldenrod he mentions on August 4. But many of his rural roadside flower shows match what I see on my daily walks with my dog Friendly. I see the shift in the wildflowers as the seasons progress—right now I see a mix of purple/red clover, white Queen Anne’s lace, blue chicory, orange jewelweed, and some other flowers I can’t identify.
And Borland reminds me that the New England asters that sprinkle these vacant lots along roadsides will be here soon, as summer turns to fall.
He mentions the katydids on July 24 and I saw my first baby katydid of the season on July 12, on a fleabane plant. Later I started seeing them on the walls of our garage at night and recently I began hearing their loud calls of "Katy did! She did!" against the softer background sound of what I think are crickets. Staying up until 4 a.m. recently I noticed the katydids stopped calling by then, leaving only the crickets. I saw my first cricket indoors as I updated this blog early in the morning of August 6.
He hasn't mentioned wooly bear worms though, but I've been seeing them cross the roads, with varying widths of brown and black, proving to me that their bands show only their age, not what next winter will be like. I demolished that myth in an early blog ("Wooly Bears Only Predict Their Ages", November 6, 2013).
This remains the most popular of my blogs, either because of the topic or because it was my very first one!
(I'm used to calling them worms, even though they are caterpillars that become tiger moths.)
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