Understanding Solunar Intelligence in CatchMate

What is Solunar Intelligence?

Solunar theory is the idea that fish feeding activity is influenced by the position of the moon relative to the earth. When the moon is directly overhead or directly underfoot, gravitational pull on water is at its strongest — and fish tend to be more active, moving freely and feeding with less caution. The same effect, to a lesser degree, occurs as the moon rises and sets.

CatchMate's Solunar Intelligence feature brings this data directly into your fishing log, helping you spot patterns in when you catch, plan sessions around the best windows, and understand your results in a new light.

How to Turn It On

Solunar Intelligence is turned off by default. To enable it:

1. Tap the Settings icon in the app
2. Scroll down to the Moon Phases section
3. Toggle Solunar Intelligence on

Once enabled, moon phase data and solunar windows will appear across your session history, venue history, fishing plan, and catch pattern analytics. Turning it off again simply hides the data — nothing is deleted.

What You'll See

In Session History

Each past session's weather tile displays a moon phase summary, including:

• The current moon phase (e.g. Waxing Gibbous) and illumination percentage
• A star rating reflecting overall solunar strength for that day
• The four solunar windows for that session date — two major and two minor

In Venue History

Each session row in a venue's history tab shows a moon emoji and star rating at a glance, so you can quickly scan which sessions coincided with strong solunar conditions.

In the Fishing Plan (Intelligence)

The weekly forecast shows a solunar badge next to each day. Tap a day to see the full solunar breakdown — phase, illumination, and all four windows — so you can plan which sessions are worth waking up early for.

In Catch Pattern Analytics

The Solunar Correlation panel in Catch Patterns shows what percentage of your recorded catches fell during a major window, a minor window, or outside any solunar window. Over time, this tells you whether solunar timing genuinely correlates with your catches at your venues.

Understanding the Star Rating

The star rating reflects the strength of the moon phase:

Rating	Moon Phase
★★★★	New Moon or Full Moon
★★★	Waxing or Waning Gibbous
★★	Waxing or Waning Crescent
★	First or Last Quarter

New and full moons produce the strongest gravitational pull on water. Quarter moons produce the weakest. The rating tells you how productive the day's solunar activity is overall — the windows tell you exactly when to be alert.

Understanding the Solunar Windows

Each day has four windows:

Major Windows (2 per day)

Roughly two hours each, centred on the moment the moon is directly overhead or directly underfoot. These are traditionally considered the most productive feeding periods.

Minor Windows (2 per day)

Roughly one hour each, occurring as the moon rises and sets. Secondary feeding activity often coincides with these.

On a match day, if a major solunar window overlaps with the first hour on the peg, that's worth knowing. If your best catch typically comes at 11am and a major window runs 10:30–12:30, that's not a coincidence — it's a pattern worth tracking.

Does It Work for Commercial Fisheries?

Solunar theory was originally developed for wild fisheries, but CatchMate's analytics let you find out whether it holds at your venues. Commercial fisheries with stocked carp and F1s often show solunar feeding responses, particularly in warmer months when fish are more active near the surface.

The Catch Patterns correlation panel will, over time, show you whether your catches at specific venues cluster around windows. With enough sessions logged, this becomes a genuinely useful planning tool.

Your Existing Sessions

All your previously logged sessions are automatically updated with solunar data — there's nothing to backfill manually. As soon as you enable the toggle, your full history is ready to explore.

Solunar Intelligence is included in CatchMate at no extra cost. Enable it in Settings → Moon Phases.