Three bright planets stairstep up the evening sky for most of the month. Venus, the Evening Star, is the brightest, followed by Jupiter, then Mercury (see Featured Event). Scorpius arcs low across the south during the night, while the Summer Triangle—the bright stars Vega, Deneb, and Altair—is in the east at nightfall and soars high overhead in the wee hours. The Big Dipper is high in the north at nightfall early in the month, but a little lower in the northwest by June’s end.
The full Moon of June is known as the Flower Moon, Strawberry Moon, Rose Moon, or Honey Moon.
Perigee June 14
Apogee June 28
Moon phases are Central Time.
Cygnus, the swan, is a signpost for charting Earth’s path through the galaxy. As you face Cygnus as it rises in the northeast, you’re looking forward in our orbit around the Milky Way. The center of the galaxy is to the right, in Sagittarius.
Hydra, the water snake, wriggles across the southwest this evening. The galaxy M83 is near its tail, low in the south at nightfall. Under dark skies, some people can see the galaxy as a smudge of light. It is the most-distant object visible to the human eye, at about 15 million light-years.
A pretty little semicircle of stars crowns the sky on spring and summer nights: Corona Borealis, the northern crown. It’s high in the east as night falls, and stands overhead a few hours later. In a couple of months, it will be overhead at nightfall.
While the Moon orbits Earth and Earth orbits the Sun, the Sun isn’t exactly standing still. In fact, it’s racing around the center of the Milky Way galaxy, carrying Earth and the other planets with it.
The faint constellation Lynx is in the west and northwest at nightfall. It’s above Pollux and Castor, the twins of Gemini, which are almost due west, and brighter Capella, the leading light of Auriga, the charioteer, to their lower right.
The Moon will be “new” tomorrow as it passes between Earth and Sun, so it will be hidden in the Sun’s glare. And even if the Sun wasn’t in the way, there wouldn’t be much to see. It’s night on the lunar hemisphere that faces our way, so the Moon is dark.
The twins of Gemini are dropping feet-first toward the western horizon as night falls. One of those feet is marked by a small, faint smudge of light: the star cluster M35. It is about 2,500 light-years away and contains about 150 stars.
Vulpecula, the fox, rises in late evening. The constellation is quite faint. Its brightest star — a red giant more than 200 light-years from Earth — is visible to the unaided eye only from a dark location, away from city lights.
The planet Venus, which blazes as the “morning star,” perches quite close to the crescent Moon at dawn tomorrow. Venus is the brightest object in the night sky other than the Moon, so you can’t miss it.
Look for the Moon before sunrise tomorrow, with Venus, the “morning star,” to its lower left. Despite its moniker, Venus is a planet, not a star. In fact, it’s our closest planetary neighbor, passing as close as 27 million miles away.
