Sunday, January 12, 2020

The Wolf Moon

We had a wolf moon on 10th January, with a partial eclipse later in the evening. I managed to capture a photo of the moon as it rose over the horizon.


The January Full Moon is often called the Wolf Moon. Wolves  howl to communicate over long distances. It is a way of saying “here I am” to the rest of the pack or “stay away” to intruders.
While an average howl from a single wolf lasts from 3 to 7 seconds, a chorus by a pack can last from 30 to 120 seconds and longer during the breeding season. So wolves are particularly loud and vocal in the first months of the year, which is probably why people associated the month of January with howling wolves.  The scientific community has no indication that the  Moon phase plays any particular part in the calls of the wolf, but wolves are nocturnal animals, so they are in general more active at night. And wolves do howl in the direction of the Moon; they point their faces toward the sky for better acoustics, because projecting their howl upward carries the sound farther.
Information is from    https://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/moon/wolf.html

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