AUGUST, the eighth calendar month, the last full month of summer season - "The Dog Days of Summer", back to school, and those final vacation days. August also brings the best bounty of the season, ripened tomatoes, juicy watermelon, sweet corn and perfect zucchini! Try some new recipes - my mother's favorite - pickled watermelon
August National Holidays:
- August 1, Lammas Day, was a traditional festival marking the annual wheat and corn harvest. Lammas also marked the mid-point between the summer solstice and autumn equinox and was a cross-quarter day.
- August 10 St. Lawrence’s Day. “Fair weather on St. Lawrence’s Day indicates a fair autumn.”
- August 11 marks the end of the Dog Days of Summer, which began on July 3.
- August 17 is the beginning of the Cat Nights, this bit of Irish folklore legend led to the idea that a cat has nine lives.
- August 19 National Aviation Day, the birthday of Orville Wright who piloted the first recorded flight of a powered heavier-than-air machine in 1903.
- August 24 St. Bartholomew Day. “At St. Bartholomew, there comes cold dew.”
- August 26 Women’s Equality Day, which celebrates the 1920 ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment and, with it, women’s right to vote in the United States.
August FUN Celebrations:
- Aug. 1–7: International Clown Week
- Aug. 3: National Watermelon Day
- Aug. 8: National Sneak Some Zucchini Upon Your Neighbors’ Porch Day
- Aug. 10: National S’mores Day
- Aug 12: Vinyl Record Day
- Aug. 13: International Left-Handers Day
- Aug. 20: International Geocaching Day
- Aug. 20: World Honeybee Day
- Aug. 25: Kiss-and-Make-Up Day
August Astronomy
August’s full moon, the full Sturgeon Moon, will reach peak illumination on the night of Thursday, August 19 and a seasonal Blue Moon this year. The Sturgeon Moon is named for the giant sturgeon of the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain that were most readily caught during this part of summer. It’s also the final supermoon of the year!
August Moon Phases
August 4: New Moon
August 7: Venus near Mercury
August 12: Perseid meteor shower peak
August 14: Jupiter near Mars
August 19: Full Moon, Blue Moon, Supermoon
August 21: Moon near Saturn; lunar occultation of Saturn
August 27: Moon near Jupiter
August Folklore
- As August, so February.
- Observe on what day in August the first heavy fog occurs and expect a hard frost on the same day in October.
- If the first week of August is unusually warm, the winter will be white and long.
- So many August fogs, so many winter mists.
- When it rains
in August,
It raises honey
and wine.
