Is the moon’s orbit over Belgium fairly constant? And if so, where is she walking?

Answer

In any case, the position in the sky is perfectly predictable for any time at any place on Earth. The moon therefore shows no unexpected cures.
Where exactly that moon is in our sky is determined by a lot of parameters: the earth revolves around the sun in a certain plane, the earth itself revolves around its axis, and that axis makes an angle of 67° with that plane, through which we know seasons. The moon itself orbits in a plane around the earth. That plane makes a fixed angle of a good 5° with the orbital plane of the earth. The angle between that plane and the equatorial plane of our earth varies during the year between at least 18° and at most 28°.
I tell all that to show that the exact position of the moon in our sky, in a certain place in Flanders, on a certain day of the year, at a certain time of that day … depends on a lot of things. Yearbooks such as the annual SKY CALENDAR of the VVS (Association for Astronomy www.vvs.be) contain tables with the daily rise, height in the south, set, phase…

But two practical rules:

1) When do we see the moon, in which direction?
You know the moon has phases. At first quarter hour the moon will be in the south about sunset, and set about midnight.
On a full moon, the moon rises in the east when the sun sets and is in the south in the middle of the night to set in the west in the morning.
At the last quarter of an hour, the moon does not rise until around midnight and is in the south at sunrise. Settlement in the west is then towards noon.
At new moon … the moon is more or less between us and the sun and so we don’t see it (or we see a narrow crescent) So it rises and sets at about the same time as the sun.

2) How high does the moon rise in the south?
There is a lesser-known rule of thumb for this, which is a consequence of the fact that the orbital plane of the moon deviates only 5° from the orbit of the earth.
The rule is the following :

– Add to the month 3 months per quarter of the phases (those three months for 1st quarter, six months for full moon and 9 months for last quarter), and wonder how high the sun would be in that month. That gives a good approximation for the height of the moon.

example : how high does the full moon go in winter ?

Full moon = 2 quarters. So we add 3 months twice, to the winter, so that we are in the summer. Then the sun rises high in the south. So : in winter the full moon comes high in the south. (and so low in summer, average in spring and autumn)

example : how high is the moon in autumn when it is in the first quarter ?

we add three months to autumn (because of the first quarter of an hour) and thus arrive in winter. Then the sun only rises low in the south. So in the fall the moon is low in the south in the first quarter of an hour. (and she comes high in the last quarter, because autumn + three times 3 months = summer)

This is a rough rule of thumb, but it is well known and used by amateur astronomers to quickly know what the moon’s behavior is like during a given month.