Red moon
A red moon gets its color from the air between you and it: near the horizon, or through haze and wildfire smoke, moonlight loses its blue and arrives orange or red. The moon has not changed, only what you see it through.
What it may mean
The moon has hardly any color of its own; it is gray rock shining with borrowed sunlight. When it rises orange, or glows deep red through summer haze or the smoke of a distant fire, the color comes from the miles of air its light has crossed to reach you. Dust and smoke scatter the blue away, and the warm colors are what is left. The red tells you about the space in between, not about the moon. Old sayings still gave the color a message of its own, water for the Zuni and war in Macedonia. With people, too, the space in between matters. How someone looks to you can depend on what lies between you: a tiring week, an old argument, something you heard secondhand. Haze is easier to allow for once you know it is there.
Depending on how you saw it
An orange moon on a summer night
In summer the full moon rides low, and warm, hazy air keeps it orange for longer. It looks festive and a little unreal. What ordinary thing around you looks special in a certain light, and could you see it that way more often?
A red moon behind wildfire smoke
When smoke drifts in from distant fires, the moon can turn deep red even high in the sky. The color is beautiful and also a sign of trouble far away. What far-off event has been tinting your mood this week, even though your own street looks the same?
Why it happens in nature
Moonlight is reflected sunlight. When the moon is low, its light crosses much more of the atmosphere, and air, dust and smoke scatter the blue light away, leaving orange and red. Haze, pollution and wildfire smoke can redden it further, sometimes even when it is high in the sky.
What folk beliefs say
Zuni (New Mexico)
A Zuni weather saying, recorded in 1903, ran: "The moon, her face if red be, of water speaks she."
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 2 (1903), vol. 2, p. 963. View the page
Macedonia
In Macedonia, a red moon was a sign of coming war.
Source: Cora Linn Daniels; C. M. Stevans (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Superstitions, Folklore, and the Occult Sciences of the World, vol. 2 (1903), vol. 2, p. 957. View the page
To reflect on
What has been coloring the way you see someone close to you lately?