BS: Feast of planets.

Subject: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 05:36 AM

Venus and Jupiter cosying up in the evening.
Saturn and Spica make a bright pair in the morning, as do Mars and Regulus.
Anyone else watching?

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 07:22 AM

I will keep an eye open for them Keith. I have not seen Venus for a while, although you would have had to be blind to miss Jupiter over recent months. Probably I have been going out too late to catch Venus - and I also don't always get a clear enough view of the horizon where I live. It is overcast at the moment, but I shall keep an eye open when the skies clear. Time to check out Stellarium! Thanks for the tip.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 02:01 PM

Mars is up late evening. Worth looking out in March for Venus and Jupiter together.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 03:47 PM

All cloud here!
I never sussed out the stars and planets - too much reflected city light where I grew up combined with being slightly short sighted, so only the brightest things obvious enough to identify (e.g. major constellations).
It helps if someone local pints out what, where and when to look.
Any suggestions?
Quack!
Geoff the Duck.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 03:53 PM

Sure Geoff.
Venus and Jupiter are brighter than any star, and unlike stars do not twinkle.
If we get a clear evening, look into the last glow of sunset.
venus will be the first star you see.
Turn a quarter to your left and up a bit for jupiter.

In the morning, follow the curve of the handle of the plough across the sky.
First a reddish star, then another star with a nearby companion not twinkling. Saturn.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 21 Jan 12 - 05:03 AM

And, Geoff, pick up on alanabit's suggestiion of Stellarium. It's a free downloadable planetarium program which shows the night sky with convenient labels. It starts up showing the south at the actual time, but you use the left and right arrows to move round the horizon, and up and down to move vertically. Menus with icons appear around the bottom and the left if you move the cursor over to them, and allow a lot of variations, such as choosing somewhere nearer to you than Paris as the default location.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 21 Jan 12 - 03:01 PM

When I looked at what programmes I have already have on my PC, I found Stellarium already there as one of the
Portable Apps Suite which contains lots of other useful programmes I regularly use.

Wikipedia will tell me exact latitude and longitude for nearest town, so I don't have to pretend I am living in Paris.

It doesn't solve the total cloud cover though!

Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 22 Jan 12 - 05:00 AM

I like the site Heavens Above.
They can give the co-ords of quite small towns/villages from a database, and give times of satellite passes as well as charts.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Skivee
Date: 22 Jan 12 - 12:58 PM

Yup, I'm watching. If you have good enough glass, it's possible to see the Galilean moons of Jupiter with just 7x50 binoculars.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 22 Jan 12 - 02:27 PM

Keith - This evening I found myself actually driving towards the last glow of sunset. The bright object just to the left and up a bit (Venus) couldn't be missed. After that I was driving almost directly South in traffic, so not able to watch properly, but occasional glances out of a side window had a high one visible.
Back home, checking on Stellarium, the first was definitely Venus,, but I suspect it then moved low in the sky, so not visible behind hedges. I think the high object must have been Jupiter, not Venus.
During the drive, in the open countryside, as it grew dark, stars started to appear, but nowhere near as bright as the planets.
Back home, clouds, street lights and houses. Nothing to be seen!
Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Jan 12 - 02:31 PM

Geoff, The higher one is indeed Jupiter

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 22 Jan 12 - 04:08 PM

That's right Geoff. If you get out too late, you miss Venus, because it is closer to the Sun than the Earth, so you always see it in the West in the evening and in the East in the morning, if it is on that side. For the same reason it is not so easy to spot Mercury (which is even closer to the Sun and far less bright). Skivee is right about the moons of Jupiter, of course. You need a steady hand and good neck muscles though. As I have a crushed vertebrae in my neck, I have quite a lot of difficulty keeping things steady enough to see them!
I am going to take up Keith's tip about Saturn and Mars when I get the chance and the sky is clear enough. Mars is usually very bright and you can't miss the red colour. Saturn is usually bright enough to be distinguishable if you know where it is. I have not yet ever quite managed to see the rings clearly through a telescope or bins. I think I shall get someone more expert to help!

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 23 Jan 12 - 01:14 PM

Thanks for the info. I better start paying more attention.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jan 12 - 02:46 AM

The rings are well placed just now.
They disappear edge on.

Venus follows the sun down, but the sun goes down diagonally left to right, so Venus appears on the left side of the afterglow.
I think that was why Geof was uncertain of it.
It will get very close to Jupiter over the next weeks.
Mars is now visible late evening left of Leo in the East.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jan 12 - 04:26 AM

I am working on the process of getting a picture of jupiter with a webcam attached to a telescope. Sounds easy when you read how to do it, in practice it is a fiddly process. Just getting the planet on the screen is a major triumph. John

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 24 Jan 12 - 04:43 AM

My other half can see neither the colour of stars (they all look the same), nor any twinkling, so can't tell planets from stars. Is this a common disability, and does it have a name?

Paws

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST,Ian Mather sans cookie
Date: 24 Jan 12 - 11:34 AM

Yes Wolfhound, the condition is called myopia..

I am skiing in The Alps at present and here, 2500m high, no cities nearby, a clear night is amazing. Pity I have had too much vin to focus on the bugger.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 24 Jan 12 - 04:46 PM

Keith - my uncertainty about matters visually celestial isn't so much about being vague about positioning, more a total absence of knowledge with which to judge that positioning. I've learned more about planet spotting from this thread than I'd picked up in 50 years of urban night skies, but if I hadn't been driving on Sunday at the time, location and direction I found myself, the info from this thread wouldn't have been useful, as I would not have been able to relate it to the right visual clues.
Quack!

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 25 Jan 12 - 10:49 AM

I attempt to study the heavens with a "SKYWATCHER" (76 mm dia. mirror x 700 mm focal length) telescope. Even using the f10 eyepiece with the Barlow lens, carefully focussed, which should give a magnification of x140 the resulting image seems no bigger than with the naked eye. What can be wrong?.

Frustrated of Kemsing

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: MMario
Date: 25 Jan 12 - 10:54 AM

yup - I've never been able to distinguish any colour in stars, nor twinkling...

'course until I got glasses I was convinced constellations were a world wide conspiracy - because I coudn't SEE most of the stars involved.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 25 Jan 12 - 11:44 AM

John, what are you looking at? Stars will still seem pinpoints, but further apart. Planets will look disc like, except Saturn. It should be possible to distunguish some features on them. (I think I saw Mars' polar cap last time it was close, but I'm not absolutely it wasn't my eye blurring.) The Moon should look pretty good.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 25 Jan 12 - 12:00 PM

Penny,
      I think I expected too much. I focussed on Jupiter expecting it to be enormous, having been blown away by Prof. Brian Cox`s programmes, but sadly not. I can certainly make out the Moon`s features. Perhaps doing it from inside doesn`t help so I shall persist outside on the clearest night at the risk of catching my death of cold.   

John

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 25 Jan 12 - 02:46 PM

The illustrations on boxes are a bit misleading. I was also disappointed. My view of Jupiter is quite small - there's a $0 in a green bubble above the posting box here which is bigger than it, about twice the width. But the bands are clear. As are Saturn's rings. I had a brilliant view some year's back, from my bedroom window, through glass (I can't remember if this preceded my double glazing) of Saturn being occulted by the Moon. Small, but perfectly formed.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 10 Feb 12 - 06:23 AM

Mars now rises before Venus and Jupiter set, so all 3 in the sky at once.
By April Saturn will have joined them too.
To have all four in the sky together is a little unusual.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 04:32 AM

Just bringing this thread back.
Thanks for starting it, Keith.
Before this thread I had no idea how to spot a planet. Now I can identify three of the blighters.
A lot of cloud during the past couple of weeks, but on the odd clear evening I've seen the three on one occasion and Jupiter and Venus lined up with a sliver of a crescent moon.
Having the fixed reference points of the two planets has also emphasised how much the position of the moon moved around in the sky.
All very interesting.
Quack!
Geoff.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 05:54 AM

I saw that crescent moon with Jupiter and Venus too.
A lovely sight.
Glad we shared it.
keith.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 07:03 AM

Have photos of that grouping - and Mercury on the same night. It doesn't look like its going to be visible again because of cloud, but it was clearly visible to the naked eye about 30 minutes after sunset. We'd forgotten to take binoculars out or might have seen it sooner, though it doesn't show up on the shots I took of the sky in the right area.

NB do not start looking for it with binoculars or telescope before the Sun is completely down.

It's on a line between the last position of the Sun and Venus, and about a third of the way along that line from the horizon.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Mr Happy
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 07:35 AM

'I saw that crescent moon with Jupiter and Venus too.
A lovely sight.
Glad we shared it.'

Ditto.

Like they were following each other in an arc

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: kendall
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 12:52 PM

Mighty impressive I say.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Joe_F
Date: 01 Mar 12 - 08:41 PM

I remember a little story about a hungry god entering the solar system. Of course, he went for the pretty blue&white planet. He didn't fancy the ice at the top & bottom, so he flicked that off with a finger.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Newport Boy
Date: 02 Mar 12 - 03:31 AM

Jupiter & Venus have been very clear here for the past week or two, and I had good viewing of the 4 Jovian moons earlier this week. One evening I also had the pleasure of a pass of the International Space Station.

Not astronomical, but it pleases me: I'm using the nightly builds of Firefox as my browser, and the title bar viewing this thread reads:

mudcat.org: Feast of planets. - Nightly

Phil

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 02 Mar 12 - 04:52 AM

I like to see old ISS pass, especially if accompanied by a supply craft. (sadly never a Shuttle again.)
So few people are aware of it.
I am sure there would be interest if TV weather reports included passes on clear nights.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 06 Mar 12 - 02:59 PM

Saw Mercury tonight, just dipping down behind a tree. Couldn't get a photo, as I had forgotten to recharge the battery.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 06 Mar 12 - 06:05 PM

Is it close to Venus at the moment? I shall try to get out to look for it tomorrow if the sky is clear early on in the evening. I didn't get out until about ten tonight - and by then only Mars was to be seen.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 06 Mar 12 - 06:32 PM

It's not close. You can spot Venus and Jupiter easily, Venus being the brighter one, both quite high above the western horizon. Mercury is below them, on a line from them at about 45 degrees towards the last light of the sun, about a third of the way up from the horizon towards them.
Or download Stellarium and install it (free), so you can see a mockup of the sky.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 06 Mar 12 - 07:34 PM

Forgot to add - it's visible from about 20 mins after sunset until it gets too low to see, about 6.20 to 6.50 according to Stellarium at the latitude of Greenwich.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 07 Mar 12 - 04:34 AM

Thanks Penny. At the moment it does not look as if I am going to be lucky with the weather here in Köln, but I shall hope it clears up. Venus and Jupiter are no problem to find - you would have to be blind to miss them!

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 07 Mar 12 - 04:52 AM

Mercury is a real challenge at high latitudes.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 07 Mar 12 - 05:30 AM

Yes, but once you've seen it once, it gets easier in future. Binoculars help (BUT ONLY AFTER SUNSET!) but it can be spotted with the naked eye. I always find that it is higher up than I initially look. It gets quite bright for that bit of the sky - apart from planes, it is the only object visible down there, stars only come out some time later.

What I do want to do is catch it in the morning - my new place has a good eastern horizon from the front bedroom, so I wouldn't even need to get dressed properly.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 07 Mar 12 - 11:34 AM

Of course the real challenge in high latitudes is what I've got in between me and it today.

Nice that the drought seems to have broken, though.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Mar 12 - 10:44 AM

I saw the thread title and thought it was about black holes.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 06:32 AM

Venus and Jupiter at their closest tonight.
Worth a look. Not that common.
Mars at its best too.
In the East at evening, and south by midnight.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 06:34 AM

http://earthsky.org/tonight/best-venusjupiter-conjunction-in-years-mid-march-2012

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 04:27 PM

Mars, Venus and Jupiter all look splendid tonight. If it is still this clear on Saturday, I intend to see if I can spot Mercury and Saturn as well. It's an impressive sky.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:00 PM

Too late for Mercury I'm afraid. Not for nothing is the name used for the speedy messenger of the gods, and for quicksilver.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:06 PM

And the next morning apparition will be too low to see, because the ecliptic will be at a low angle.

I've seen someone report elsewhere that they've seen Venus before sunset, as it's so bright.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: alanabit
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 06:50 PM

I was a bit unlucky with Mercury, I guess. There was just too much cloud to have any chance of spotting it recently. Tonight has been the first clear night for ages. I suppose that with a smaller orbit and low elevation, you are always going to need a bit of luck. I saw it for the first time with help from your advice about a year ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: EBarnacle
Date: 16 Mar 12 - 11:43 AM

I've been enjoying the approach dance between Venus and Jupiter. I had hoped they would line up even closer, though.

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 16 Mar 12 - 05:23 PM

After a few cloudy nights, I was surprised to see how much the position of Venus and Jupiter had changed, with Venus up and to the right, where a few weeks back at the start of this thread, Jupiter had been considerably higher relatively.
What should we expect to see next?
Quack!
GtD

Subject: RE: BS: Feast of planets.
From: Penny S.
Date: 16 Mar 12 - 05:43 PM

Geoff, if you download Stellarium, free, you can run it forward, or use the date changing option to find out.

Cloudy tonight. Bah!

Mind you, it does show something referred to in the Bible, though the Bible is referring to the morning version. One of the prophets describes the king of Babylon (I think - somewhere in Mesopotamia, anyway) as being like Lucifer - which is the morning name of Venus, (evening is Hesperus) rising up and challenging God, before falling below the Earth.

Up there now you can see how Venus is outshining Jupiter, the king of the gods, before its orbit brings it rushing westward to get west of the Sun again.

Totally misunderstood that passage, a metaphor from astronomy, nothing to do with Satan at all.

Penny