This is another month for insomniac Master Naturalists. Venus and Saturn appear in the morning sky, nearly four hours before sunrise at the beginning of the month. Mercury appears now just before dawn, reaches its maximum "elongation" or visual distance from the sun on 10 Sep, when it appears very bright(negative magnitude) just an hour before dawn and almost on top of the star Regulus. All this makes 10 Sep an interesting morning for planet watchers. If you want excitement, check out the Cassini-Huygens Mission, or the Mission to Mars.
Posted by The Naturalist at September 4, 2004 7:37 PM