August's Top Beginner's Targets

In August, we have one of the best meteor showers of the year for the naked eye. The Perseids should offer their best viewing in the morning hours of the 12th and 13th of the month. The shower will appear to radiate from the Northeast from the constellation of Perseus.

Telescopic Sights
Many of June's and July's picks are still available for viewing in August. See these pages for tips on locating them.

We'll concentrate our August tour in the constellation Sagittarius. Find the teapot asterism (or house) in the South and you're there. Sagittarius is home to dozens of wonderful sights and is a great place to just scan with your telescope as you'll pick up dozens of open and globular clusters. When you look toward Sagittarius you're looking toward the center of the Milky Way.

M22 is one of the best globular clusters for Northern Hemisphere observers. To locate M22, use the top of the teapot (Kaus Borealis) and the top star of the handle of the teapot (Nunki). M22 forms the corner of an "L" with these 2 stars. M22 consists of approximately 500,000 stars located 10,000 lightyears away.

Also in the same area is a much dimmer globular cluster, M28. M28 is located just above the top star of the teapot (Kaus Borealis). It will provide a nice comparison with the much closer M22. M28 contains about 100,000 stars and is located approximately 15,000 lightyears from us.

The Lagoon Nebula (M8) is located just above the teapot and presents a wonderful example of an emission nebula. To locate it, use the star in the top of the handle (Nunki) of the teapot and the star at the top of the teapot (Kaus Borealis). Follow this line the same distance out from the teapot and you're there. The Lagoon Neb is quite larget so use a low to medium powered eyepiece to get the most out of the view. Embedded within the nebula is an Open Cluster, NGC6530. The Nebula is a cloud of ionized hydrogen gas approximately 50 lightyears in diameter located approximately 5000 lightyears from us.

Just North of the Lagoon Nebula (about a low powered eypiece field's width) is another fine Nebula, the Trifid (M20). The trifid is much smaller than the lagoon and will require dark skies to get a good view. The trifid is also a cloud of Ionized gas approximately 25 lighyears in diameter which is located about 2500 lightyears from us. Embedded within the nebula is a multiple star system, HN 40. Small scopes will show it as a double star while a 6" - 8" scope will show an additional 2 members.

Just outside of the eyepiece view to the Northeast is the Open Cluster, M21. This is a loose aggregation of about 50 stars of which a dozen or so are visible in small scopes. M21 is also located about 2500 lightyears away.

One of the brightest Nebulae in the sky is the Swan Nebula (M17), also located in Sagittarius. Using the depth of the teapot as a gauge, go up (North) from the top of the teapot about 1 and a half times this distance toward the constellation Scutum. Scutum contains several 4th magnitude stars which form a diamond shape. The lower star of the "diamond" also points right at M17. M17 appears as a check-mark shape in the scope and provides a fascinating view. The nebula is located about 5000 lightyears away from us.

These are just a sampling of the many gems located in this area of the sky. A good star chart will point you to many more in this area.

The Planets
Jupiter and Saturn are up early in the morning hours.