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Three Buoys Tackle • Elkton, MD
Three Buoys Tackle
THE CROW'S NEST

Fishing windows, with the working shown

Every forecast app hands you a number and asks you to believe it. This one shows its arithmetic: each window is the sum of named factors — first light, the solunar periods, moving tide, a live temperature reading — and anything we could not measure is listed by name, with the reason. Research first. Claims second.

First quarter · 42% lit · day 6.6 of the lunar month

The next three days

Today

2026-10-17
Sunrise
7:11 am
Sunset
6:19 pm
Moonrise
1:53 pm
Moonset
11:07 pm
4:49 pm – 7:47 pm Prime
  • · Dusk — the evening feed.
  • · Solunar major — moon overhead.
  • · Tide is moving (ebb) through this window.
10:22 pm – 11:52 pm Slow
  • · Solunar minor — moonset.
  • · Tide is moving (flood) through this window.
  • · Forecast wind about 25 mph — rough, plan accordingly.

Tomorrow

2026-10-18
Sunrise
7:12 am
Sunset
6:18 pm
Moonrise
2:30 pm
Moonset
—
5:37 am – 8:42 am Good
  • · Solunar major — moon underfoot.
  • · First light — low sun and feeding light.
  • · Tide is moving (ebb) through this window.
  • · Forecast wind about 20 mph — rough, plan accordingly.
1:45 pm – 3:15 pm Slow
  • · Solunar minor — moonrise.
  • · Around slack water (slack before the flood) — expect a pause mid-window.
4:48 pm – 8:35 pm Prime
  • · Dusk — the evening feed.
  • · Solunar major — moon overhead.
  • · Tide is moving (ebb) through this window.

Mon Oct 19

2026-10-19
Sunrise
7:13 am
Sunset
6:17 pm
Moonrise
3:01 pm
Moonset
12:09 am
11:24 pm – 12:54 am Fair
  • · Solunar minor — moonset.
  • · Tide is moving (flood) through this window.
  • · Forecast wind about 10 mph — comfortable water.
6:25 am – 8:55 am Prime
  • · Solunar major — moon underfoot.
  • · First light — low sun and feeding light.
  • · Tide is moving (ebb) through this window.
2:16 pm – 3:46 pm Slow
  • · Solunar minor — moonrise.
  • · Tide is moving (flood) through this window.
  • · Forecast wind about 20 mph — rough, plan accordingly.
4:47 pm – 9:23 pm Prime
  • · Dusk — the evening feed.
  • · Solunar major — moon overhead.
  • · Tide is moving (ebb) through this window.

Not in this forecast

Every factor had live data behind it for this forecast.

Live water temperature: 62.6°F — read from the gauge, never modelled.

How a window earns its score

Three layers, in order of certainty. Astronomy is arithmetic and never missing: sunrise, sunset, moon phase, moonrise and set, and the lunar transits. Dawn and dusk are feeding fact; the solunar majors and minors are a century of angling tradition, and we label them as the theory they are. Season comes from our own guides — every species claim on this page links to the article that backs it. Live readings — water temperature against the species’ feeding band, tide movement, forecast wind — join the score only when the gauge or the NWS actually answered.

Overlap is the whole game: first light landing on a solunar major with a moving tide is what a Prime morning is. The score is the receipt, not the promise — weather changes, and fish have not read the theory.

FactorWeight
First light / dusk+25
Solunar major (moon over/underfoot)+30
Solunar minor (moonrise / moonset)+15
Tide moving through the window+10
Light wind (≤12 mph)+5
Heavy wind (≥18 mph)-15
New or full moon×1.2 on lunar factors

The lookout grades itself

0 stamped reports in the book

Every catch and fishing report filed on this site is stamped with the conditions it happened under — the moon, the light, the solunar period, and what this page was rating that hour. The stamps accumulate into the one thing no forecast anywhere publishes: its own record. Descriptive, not causal — this is where the community’s catches actually landed, never proof the rating made the fish bite.

The book is open — 0 of 20 reports stamped so far.

We publish the percentages when there is enough in the log to mean something. Small-sample percentages are how honest data becomes a dishonest claim. File a report and the book fills.

Fished a window? Tell the fleet how it held up.

Field reports are how the lookout gets sharper — and how the next angler decides.