Backyard Astronomer - Delta College Public Radio

Look low to the east after dark and you should see a pretty little cluster of stars. Its shape might remind you of a miniature Little Dipper, but it’s actually the famous Pleiades Star Cluster.

Each season has a notable constellation or group of stars that can serve as a guidepost to that part of the sky. In summer it’s common to use the Summer Triangle and in autumn we have the Great Square of Pegasus.

The Moon will take on an oval shape this week as the visible portion starts to wane, or become smaller. This allows the Moon to be seen in the morning sky after sunrise.

The media buzz is growing about what could be a bright comet gracing our skies this month. It’s called Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, or “A3” for short, and astronomers have been eagerly anticipating its approach for many weeks.

Look high in the northeast for a group of bright stars that resembles a big “W” sitting on its end. This is the constellation of Cassiopeia the Queen.

If you look low in the southeast sky after dark, you’ll see a moderately bright star that doesn’t twinkle as much as the others. This is the famous ringed planet Saturn, and it recently made its closest approach to Earth.

By September 13, the Moon will look a little more than half illuminated in the south. This is when the Delta College Planetarium in Bay City will celebrate this year’s International Observe the Moon Night!

From late August through September, Sagittarius the Archer will appear low in the south at evening twilight. With the Milky Way running through it, Sagittarius is a treasure trove of deep sky wonders for binoculars.

Away from city lights and bright moonlight, this is the time of year to see the faint band of the Milky Way stretching right over the top of the sky.

For decades now, amateur astronomy continues to be one of the fastest growing hobbies in the world. Why is that? What gets people so hooked on space and the night sky?

On August 19, the moon will be full, but this won’t be just any ordinary full moon. It’s the first "super moon" of 2024.

One of the best meteor showers of the year comes to a maximum on the evening of August 11th and morning of the 12th.

After a long hiatus, the planets Jupiter and Mars are making their way back into the pre-dawn sky.

After dusk, look about a third of the way up the eastern sky for Altair, the brightest star in Aquila the Eagle and part of the Summer Triangle.

Now is a good time to see the dark round plains called “maria,” and bright splashes of lighter material called “rays.” The southern maria offer some interesting sights in a small telescope.

Hercules, the strong man of ancient mythology, rides high overhead in early summer. While its stars are not particularly bright, its most distinctive shape are the four stars in its center known as the Keystone. Within its borders lies one of the most famous globular star clusters of the entire night sky.

As twilight ends around 10:30 pm, look low in the southeast for a bright reddish star – this is Antares, the heart of the Scorpion.

Now that summer has arrived, the famous “Summer Triangle” of stars has returned to guide us around the evening sky.

Even to the unaided eye, the moon reveals round dark regions called "maria." Before the age of telescopes, people imagined these dark stretches as oceans of water. In reality, they are vast lava plains left behind by asteroid impacts.

At the beginning of the week of June 10, the moon appears as a crescent in the west after sunset. But each night, the moon will appear to slip a little farther back or eastward among the stars.

If you follow the arc to Arcturus and keep the curve going even farther down into the south, you’ll come to a fainter bluish star, Spica.

Observe the night sky long enough and you’re bound to see something strange that’s hard to identify. It’s easy to think of a UFO, but that doesn’t automatically mean it’s an alien spaceship.

In binoculars, look near the very center of the lunar disk for a large crater that seems to have a dark, smooth floor. This is Ptolemaeus, named for Claudius Ptolemy, an astronomer of ancient Greece. Two more large craters in a line below Ptolemaeus, Aphonsus and Arzachel, complete the chain.

The moon is "new" this week, which keeps the night sky dark enough to see more stars and deep sky wonders. One distinctive little springtime constellation to look for in the south is called Corvus, the Crow.

Each season has that one constellation that serves as a signpost to the sky. In spring, many stargazers use the zodiacal constellation of Leo the Lion.