The full moon of September fell a little early, on the 10th. In a mirror image of the Old Farmer’s Almanac, here it would be the Pink Moon, also called the Paschal Full Moon, or my favourite from the North American Indian tribes, the Breaking Ice Moon (Algonquin). The “Pink” has to do with particular flowers that emerge in the Spring.

In America of course it’s the Harvest Moon and it used to be that the first school dances of the year would be the Harvest Moon Dance. There were Harvest Moon festivals, and the first autumnal advertising was likely to invoke the Harvest Moon.

As is usually the case with the Interwebby it’s a matter of falling down rabbit holes triggered by one thing, in this case a wonderful cover version of Neil Young’s old song, Harvest Moon. Enjoy.

BTW, there have been studies of the Maori names for the lunar phases but it seems they were focused on each moon night of the month and less on the seasons, perhaps because our temperate climate has less dramatic differences between the seasons:

For example, on the east coast of the North Island the appearance of the first moon after the
rising of Matariki (Pleiades) above the eastern horizon marked the arrival of the New Year. In
the far north, the South Island and the Chatham Islands it is the appearance of the star Puanga
or Rigel which marks the onset of the new year Along with the presence or absence of stars
and the flowering times of plants, the phases of the moon were (and still are) used by Maori to
indicate the seasons of the year.
…
To our knowledge no record exists of a list of 12 or 13 different monthly maramataka
pertaining to one person or location, which suggests that only one was used by a local group
throughout the entire year, with adjustments being made to ensure seasonal synchronization
and adaptation to the various changes in the availability of local resources