Best Fishing Times in Dubuque, IA Today

Anglers and hunters around Dubuque, Iowa plan by the moon: two major feeding periods when the moon is directly overhead and underfoot, and two shorter minor periods at moonrise and moonset. Every window in the table above is calculated for Dubuque's exact position — 42.50°, -90.71° — and its local clock, not a generic statewide chart. Dubuque sits close to the center of its Chicago time zone, so sun and moon time stay within a few minutes of the clock — the windows above line up neatly with a standard almanac.

At 42.50° latitude, daylight in Dubuque swings from about 15.1 hours around the June solstice to roughly 8.9 hours near the December solstice — a wide 6.2-hour seasonal spread. That matters because a solunar period does its best work when it overlaps first or last light: the long days of summer push Dubuque's dawn and dusk far apart and give more chances for a major or minor to land on a low sun, while short winter days compress the action into a tight morning-and-evening window. Watch the table for periods flagged Dawn/Dusk — in Dubuque those are the windows worth rearranging your day around.

Whatever Dubuque anglers are targeting, lining trips up with the feeding windows above is the cheapest edge available. The waters around Dubuque — a community of roughly 69,698 people — see the same rhythm move both rod and rifle: the major and minor periods that switch on the bite also get deer and other game on their feet, especially when a period falls in the cool hours near sunrise or sunset. Pair the day ratings above with local weather, water temperature, barometric trend, and the season, and use the 7-day outlook to line your next Dubuque trip up with the strongest days.

Planning further out? See the monthly solunar calendar for Dubuque, which rates every day of the current month.