The indexnightdatable to the day
Bioluminescent lagoon — 6.2h of true dark, 23:40 to 05:50
Fires when dark window shrinks to 6.2h with moon nearly half lit before it sets
Photograph of night skies, standing in — nobody has published one of this. Martin Mark · CC BY-SA 4.0
Next: Thursday, September 17 — 0 days away, keyed to the published start time
This week: watch — dark window shrinks to 6.2h with moon nearly half lit before it sets. Leave by 9:32pm.
- Where
- Haulover Canal / Mosquito Lagoon, Merritt Island NWR
- Drive
- 108 minutes from Lakeland
- In season
- September
- Peak
- September
- Certainty
- datable to the day
- Drone
- no — national wildlife refuge, and it is pitch dark
- Glass
- 24–50mm at f/1.8 or faster, long exposure, ISO 6400+, widest aperture available, on a tripod
Flying here
National Wildlife Refuges: Launching, landing or operating from refuge land is prohibited without a special use permit. Overflight is again an FAA matter rather than the refuge's, but disturbing wildlife is separately unlawful and a drone over a roost or a colony is disturbance regardless of altitude. Treat this as a no unless you have the permit.
From the field
Lagoon water is 85.6°F at Trident Pier, Port Canaveral, which is in the range Pyrodinium bahamense wants (80°F and up). The moon is below the horizon for 6.2 hours of astronomical night — it is 40% lit, which sounds unhelpful until you notice it has already set: what ends this show is a moon in the sky, not a moon in the sky chart. Paddle wash and fish tracks light blue-green; it reads better to the eye than to a sensor, so bring the fastest glass you own and accept the noise. What this cannot tell you is whether it is actually glowing: temperature and darkness are necessary, not sufficient, and no public feed reports bloom density. Call an outfitter before you drive.