What's Up in the Night Sky

June 2014 - Vol. 18, No. 6

This Month's Night Sky - NOTE: The next paragraph describes the sky as it appears at 10 pm EST (11 pm EDT) near mid- month. The sky also looks this way at 11 pm EST (midnight EDT) during the beginning of the month and at 9 pm EST (10 pm EDT) by month's end.

Spica (Virgo) glows in the SW while Regulus (Leo) vanishes over the W horizon before midnight. The "big dipper" (Ursa Major's asterism) now stands on its "handle" in the N. Antares (Scorpius) is low on the S horizon. The E sky is dominated by the "summer triangle" asterism: Deneb (Cygnus), Vega (Lyra) and Altair (Aquila). An interesting star tour begins at the last star of the big dipper's handle, Alkaid. Following the curve of the handle, "arc to Arcturus". Now, following the same curve, "spike to Spica" and "continue to Corvus", its distinctive four star, kite-shaped, asterism. The long days bring short nights, but in those dark hours, the star clouds of the summer Milky Way bring joy to the deep-sky astronomer.

MERCURY is in the evening sky for the first week of June. VENUS moves from Aries into Taurus, putting on a show in the early morning near the end of the month with M45 and Aldebaran. JUPITER moves closer to the Sun, setting just 1 hour later by the end of the month. MARS after opposition grows smaller and exhibits apparent motion, approaching a conjunction with the first magnitude star, Spica, next month. The red planet continues to grow dimmer as it opens the month at -.5 magnitude and ends at 0.1! SATURN is just a few weeks after opposition is visible most night. Saturn and Mars form a triangle with the first magnitude star Arcturus throughout the month, joined by the full moon around the 13th.

Review how to determine Angular Measurement.

Calendar of Events

NOTE: For those observers not in the ET zone, convert the calendar times to your zone's time by subtracting one hour for CT, two for MT and three for PT. Don't forget to adjust for Daylight Savings Time when necessary by subtracting one hour from your planisphere's time. Dawn and dusk times must also be corrected. See your local newspaper, TV news, or cable TV's Weather Channel for sunrise and sunset times. Unfortunately some of these events may occur during daylight hours in your area.

DATE	EVENT
01	Jupiter 6 deg N. of Moon.
02	The Moon is at apogee.
04	Mercury .2 deg S. of M35, the Beehive star cluster.
08	Mars 1.6 deg N. of the Moon. Spica 1.8 deg S. of the Moon.
10	Saturn .6 deg N. of the Moon, occultation in parts of Australia and Antarctica, South Georgia and Sandwich Islands.
11	Mars at descending node.
13	This Friday the 13th brings a full moon!
15	Moon at perigee.
16	Mercury at aphelion.
19	Mercury in inferior conjunction.
21	Solstice! The sun stands still for a few days, then continues its journey - - appearing to move toward the southern hemisphere.
22	Venus 6 deg S. of Pleiades star cluster in Taurus.
24	Venus 1.3 deg N. of the Moon.
28	Look for Venus to line up between the Pleiades and Aldebaran about 45 minutes before sunrise.
30	The Moon is at apogee.

Lunar Almanac for June 2014

Phases of the Moon	Phase and Date(s)	Best viewed before local midnight
	New 27	Deep Space Objects
	1st. Qtr 5	Planets & Moon
	Full 13	Moon
	Last Qtr 19	Deep Space & Planets

Canes Venatici: Dogs of the Northern Sky

The northern sky is a dark place, far from the bright star clouds of the Milky Way. Here be dragons, bears and hunters. The northern hunters also brought their hunting dogs, in the form of a little constellation known as Canes Venatici. This constellation was introduced by Johnnes Hevelius in 1690. Visually, the constellation appears to the naked eye as two stars beneath the the handle of the "Big Dipper", the brighter of the two is known as Cor Coroli, or heart of the king. It is a 2.9 magnitude star accompanied by a 5.5 magnitude companion located about 150 light years away. This double star is very easy to detect in a small telescopeThe fainter star is called Chara, a yellow 4.3 magnitude star.

finder chart for Canes Venatici

Canes Venatici is near the north galactic pole of the Milky Way, far from the star clouds of the Milky Way. Because of its position, it is the home of many external galaxies, the brightest Messier galaxies can be located by using the finder chart above. The most famous galaxy in this part of the sky is known as M51,also known as the Whirlpool galaxy is actually a pair of interacting galaxies (NGC 5194 and 5195) that are best observed in a larger telescope, 10 inches or better. Its spiral structure was first observed by Lord Rosse using a 72-in telescope in 1845. At mag .78 it is bright enough to be seen by smaller instruments, even binoculars, but it will appear as a fuzzy patch.

M63, near an 8th mag star is tilted about 30 deg from face on, is sometimes called the Sunflower nebula. Another bright galaxy in Canes Venatici is M94, another face on spiral. this galaxy has a large central bulge and is tightly wound and will appear as a round object at a dark site. The last Messier galaxy on this chart, M106 is also a Seyfert galaxy, that emits x-rays.

Another feature of Canes Venatici is the globular star cluster M3, that is not seen in the chart above that was generated by Stellarium, a free open source planetarium program. The above image was created by Dawn Jenkins, using Stellarium and a graphic editing program to format the image for this web page. Editing was done for educational purposes only. The globular M3 is found on a line between Cor Coroli and Arcturus.

The dark galactic pole must share the night with the star clouds of the northern Milky Way, that rise into the night sky just before midnight at the beginning of the month.. The bright presence of those clouds of galactic stars and dust will make it hard to find the dark galaxies of Spring as we move into Summer.

--See You Under the Stars!
Astra for Astra's Almanac