A Review of Harrington's Spring Sky Highlights
March 2014 :
One of the problems of working a lot is that often the magazine reading pile becomes like a mini Mt. Everest; however, don’t throw any of it away, as sometimes the information found in this pile can be too informative to pass up. Such as happened recently, as I was looking through the May 2012 issue of Astronomy magazine. In it is an invitation by Phil Harrington to become introduced to some great, yet not too difficult, springtime celestial objects. And, the best part of this is they should all be able to be captured with just a pair of binoculars.
Harrington begins with a unique feature many of us have probably not thought of: using Polaris as the diamond of a circlet of stars forming a loose engagement ring. From there, he directs you to the spiral M101. Then, it’s off to M106, a beautiful spiral in an often forgotten part of the sky, Canes Venatici, the Hunting dogs, resting comfortably below the tail of Ursa Major, the Big Bear. Also within the hunting dogs is M94, not as easily observable, but still accessible with binoculars. We often think of the region of Canes Venatici as the home of globular cluster M3, so it was nice of Phil Harrington to remind us of other important deep-sky objects within this patch of sky.
On to Leo, and NGC 2903, right off Leo’s head, southwest of the tip of the sickle. This is noted to be the dimmest of these 10 objects, at magnitude 9, so consider this the greatest challenge of the group.
Harrington then has us going to Leo’s back legs, then following a curving line to Tau Leonis, which makes a nice-looking set with a star just off to its southeast. Placing these to the upper right corner of the field, you might be surprised to see three faint apparent doubles. He has named this his asterism the Double Cross. By the way, he does note that none of these do form a true binary, but this is still a nice part of the sky to observe.
Probably the hardest part of this voyage through the sky is the next object, barred spiral M83, located low in Hydra. This time, instead of having to look for a very dim object, you might have to look for a good south exposure.
Heading back north, looking just off the kite shape of Boötes, will be a not-to-be-missed optical double, Nu Boötis. They, like summer’s Albireo, are golden and bluish. Continuing upwards, stop at 16 and 17 Draconis, another – as Harrington puts it – set of stellar headlights.
Finally, his journey ends in Corona Borealis, to the star R, a variable star just about 3 degrees east-northeast of the constellation’s brightest star, Gemma (or Alphecca). It is said R’s magnitude can go from a rather bright 6 all the way to 14th. Let’s end our trek by determining approximately where it is brightnesswise.
As mentioned above, this information comes from an article written in the May 2012 Astronomy magazine, which does give more in-depth information than this short note. But, whether you read just this or find the entire article, this might be a good introduction to the sky for a new person starting out in the subject, or for the seasoned observer, just for a fun change of pace. Anyone up for it?
