March 2025 Full Worm Moon

The full Worm Moon occurs at 2:55AM EDT on March 14, 2025.  For Southern Native American tribes, the name Worm Moon came from the observation that earthworms begin to appear as the soil warms in spring.  However, early northern Native American tribes did not see earthworms in March because glaciers had wiped out all soil dwelling worms.  They used the name Worm Moon to recognize beetle larvae, a different sort of worm, that starts to emerge from the thawing bark of trees and other such places this time of year.

This full Moon is special as it treats us, weather permitting, to a total lunar eclipse that we’ll be able to watch from beginning to end!  However, there is a catch, this is a late night – early morning eclipse.  The eclipse begins at 11:57PM EDT on March 13 when the Moon begins to move into the Earth’s penumbra or lighter shadow.  While in the penumbra the Moon will look a dimmer gray, this change in color can be quite subtle.  At 1:09AM EDT the Moon begins to move into the umbra or darker shadow.  As it does, the surface of the Moon turns coppery red.  Totality, when the Moon is completely in the umbra, begins at 2:26AM EDT and will last 65 minutes to 3:31AM EDT when the Moon begins to move out of the umbra and into the penumbra.  The eclipse ends at 6:00AM EDT when the penumbral eclipse ends. 

As the Moon moves into the umbra part of the Earth’s shadow it becomes coppery red in color due to a phenomenon called Rayleigh scattering.  As sunlight enters the Earth’s atmosphere the different wavelengths of light are scattered in different directions and not all wavelengths are scattered equally.  Shorter wavelengths of light like blue and violet are scattered more strongly and are tossed out of the atmosphere.  Longer wavelengths of light like red and orange pass through Earth’s atmosphere.   During a lunar eclipse sunlight that’s not blocked by our planet is bent or refracted around the Earth and hits the surface of the Moon making it appear coppery red in color.  It’s because of this that total lunar eclipses are sometimes called “Blood Moons.”   You may hear or see this eclipse referred to as the Blood Worm Moon. The global transparency or clearness of Earth’s atmosphere affects the Moon’s brightness and color during totality. So, the more dust or clouds in earth’s atmosphere during an eclipse, the redder the Moon will be.

Lunar eclipses are easy to observe.  Just go outside, look up and marvel at what you are watching.  Get a comfortable chair, a warm drink, and a coat – it will probably be cold before the Sun comes up.  One more thing, during totality watch for meteors hitting the Moon.  A meteor hit will appear as a brief, pinpoint flash of light against the dark Moon.  Enjoy the eclipse!