Category: Sky Guide

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What to look out, and up, for in September.

Our highlights of this month’s skies with the planet on offer to observers and imagers:

• Mercury & Venus in the late evening or early morning
• Mars & Saturn – with a nice conjunction with the Moon and star Antares
• Neptune & Uranus on offer in Aquarius & Pisces
• The largest asteroid, Vesta, will be passing through the constellation Gemini into Cancer this month and asteroid 2 Pallas can still be found in the constellation Equuelus.

Next up is the meteor showers and, following the magnificent Persieds last month, September has:

• The Alpha Aurigids peaking on 1st September
• The Epsilon Persieds peaking on 9th September

Then we each take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – The Owl Custer in Cassiopeia
• Paul – globular cluster, Messier 2 in Aquarius
• Jeni – The Andromeda Galaxy in the constellation Andromeda

And we finish this sky guide with September’s moon phases.

Happy hunting and clear skies!

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What to look out, and up, for in August.

Our highlights of this month’s skies with the planet on offer to observers and imagers:

• Jupiter takes a bow as it departs until December
• Mars & Saturn – with a long conjunction at the end of August
• Mercury & Venus make their way out of the glare of the Sun
• Neptune & Uranus on offer in Aquarius & Pisces

Next up is the meteor showers and, due to the long daylight hours and dearth of cometary debris in this part of Earth’s orbit this time of year, we only have one shower of note in August:

• The magnificent Perseids peaking on 11th/12th August
• The 2nd asteroid to be discovered in the asteroid belt, 2 Pallas, reaches opposition on 22nd August reaching magnitude 8.7 and can be found in the constellation Equuelus.

Then we each take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Jeni – The Milky Way: Naked eye enjoyment of our home galaxy
• Paul – The Cygnus Loop/The Veil Nebulae
• Ralph – Albireo – the most colourful binary star in the sky

And we finish this sky guide with August’s moon phases.

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What to look out, and up, for in July.

Our highlights of this month’s skies with the planet on offer to observers and imagers:

• Mars
• Saturn
• A Venus conjunction

And a few tips on how to take images of the solar system’s largest bodies with a webcam, planetary imaging camera or DSLR.

Next up is the meteor showers and, due to the long daylight hours and dearth of cometary debris in this part of Earth’s orbit this time of year, we only have one shower of note in July:

• Delta Aquariids peaking 28th/29th July

Then we each take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Jeni – NGC6826: The Blinking Star Nebula
• Ralph – Epsilon Lyrae: The Double Double
• Paul – M22, a globular Cluster in Sagittarius.

And we finish this sky guide with July’s moon phases and planetary conjunctions.

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What to look out, and up, for in June.

Our tour of the highlights of this month’s skies begins with the planets on offer to observers and imagers:

• Jupiter
• Mars
• Saturn

Next up is the meteor showers and we have quite a few daytime showers that can be spotted in the pre-dawn sky as well as some more usual showers in June:

• Arietids
• Zeta Perseids
• June Lyrids
• June Bootids

Then we each take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – M13 The Great Globular Cluster in Hercules
• Paul – M8 The Lagoon Nebula
• Jeni – M57 The Ring Nebula

And we finish this sky guide with June’s moon phases and planetary conjunctions.

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What to look out, and up, for in March.

We start a new look (listen?) sky guide this month.

We begin the show with a discussion around the highlights to observe this May:

• The Transit of Mercury on 9th May
• International Astronomy Day on 14th May
• Mars at opposition on 22nd May
• Three meteor shower peaks, Eta Aquariids (6th), Eta Lyrids (8th) & Camelopardalids (24th)

Next we each suggest and help you find a deep sky favourite to observe in May:

• Ralph – M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy
• Paul – M3 Globular cluster in Canes Venatici
• Jeni – M27 The Dumbbell Nebula

Finally we round up the moon phases and a couple of nice planetary and lunar conjunctions.

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What to look out, and up, for in April 2016!

For the beginners this month Ralph takes a look at the Leo Lion who leaps across the sky all April. Leo hosts some nice colour contrasting binary stars (one with a gas giant planet of its own) and some galaxies to hunt down.

Next Jeni rounds up the planets that are visible in December: Jupiter Mars and Mercury at one of its most favourable viewing opportunities. The moon makes a not-to-be-missed passage through the Hyades Cluster on 10th April. And we round off with the Lyrid meteor shower and a last gasp chance of comet Catalina.

As spring is galaxy season, for the deep sky challenge Paul slews a scope through Virgo in a hunt for entire galaxies that can be seen with amateur telescopes. While the constellation of Virgo is quite indistinct it harbours a wealth of elliptical and spiral galaxies, culminating with the unique treat, Markarian’s Chain.

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What to look out, and up, for in March.

For the beginners this month we take a look at perhaps the most recognisable constellation of them all: Ursa Major, the Great Bear. In the Great Bear we go hunting for the easiest binary star in the sky and a host of big bright galaxies.

Next Jeni rounds up the planets that are visible in December: Mars, Jupiter & ever more brief views of Saturn, before taking a look at this month’s moon phases – with a few conjunctions with Mars Saturn & bright star Antares.

Finally we take the ultimate tour of easy and more difficult galaxies as we explore the rich bounty of the constellation Leo the Lion.

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What to look out, and up, for in February.

For the beginners this month we take a look at the constellation of Auriga the Charioteer with a trio of open clusters from the Messier catalogue and finishing off with the Flaming Star that originated in Orion’s Belt.

Next Jeni rounds up the planets that are visible in December: Jupiter, Mars & Saturn, before taking a look at this month’s moon phases – with a couple of conjunctions with Venus & Mercury and the occultation of star Xi 1 Ceti.

Finally we go deep into the universe with an open cluster, a beautiful multiple star system and the vast Rosette Nebula in the constellation Monoceros the Unicorn.

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What to look out, and up, for in January.

For the beginners and young astronomers this month we take a look at the magnificent winter constellation of Orion with the belt and sword bordered by four magnificent stars. We take a look at a (cosmologically) near term supernova hopeful, a five star multiple star system, and the finest nebula of them all in small telescopes or binoculars.

Next we round up the planets that are visible in January: Jupiter rising early to show us some lovely transits of its moons, with Mars Saturn and Venus providing breathtaking views for the night owls. Saturn and Venus give us a rare close conjunction too in January.

Next we take a look at the phases of the moon this month and prepare for a conjunction with gas giant planet Jupiter and an occultation with bright star Aldebaran in Taurus.

The Quadrantids provide us with a nice meteor shower early in January which can often give us more meteors per hour than any other meteor shower.

Comet C2013 US10 Catalina continues to reveal itself to northern hemisphere observers and passes some deep sky objects to add to the excitement.

Finally, we end on our deep sky challenge in the constellation of Gemini with a planetary nebula and open clusters to tease out – including the topical Jedi Knight cluster.

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For the beginners this month we take a look at the constellation of Gemini with bright star Castor providing a nice easy double star to split with a telescope. We move over to the feet of the Gemini twins to scan for some nice open clusters, including Messier 35, before hunting down the beautiful Eskimo planetary nebula. Finally, we go looking for a star known to have a planet of its own.

Next we round up the planets that are visible in December: Jupiter, Venus & Mars are still around for observers after midnight and we have the possibility of a naked eye visible comet in the early hours of the morning in early December as C2013 US10 Catalina raises northern hemisphere hopes.

We have the Geminid meteor shower peaking on the night of the 12/14th December – which always puts on a great show and then we take you on a tour of the often overlooked deep sky objects in our winter skies around the constellations of Orion, Lepus and Eridanus.