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And come Oct. 10, as Venus is passing about 2.5 degrees below Regulus, a lovely crescent moon will be passing just to the north of both star and planet and will make for an eye-catching configuration in our predawn sky. On Monday, Nov. 13 Uranus will reach opposition — the night of the year when it is closest to Earth at a distance of 1.74 billion miles, 2.78 billion km, or 155 light-minutes. (Image credit: Chris Vaughan/Starry Night)

In the eastern sky for about two hours preceding dawn on Thursday, Nov. 12, the old crescent moon will be positioned a palm's width above (or 6 degrees to the celestial west of) the bright planet Venus — making a lovely photo opportunity when composed with some interesting scenery. The following morning, the moon's orbital motion (green line) will carry it to Venus' lower left. (Image credit: )

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On the same morning that Venus is at greatest brilliancy (Sept. 19), wait until about an hour before sunrise and then, using your clenched fist at arm's length (which measures 10 degrees in width), go roughly "two fists" to Venus' lower left to catch sight of much fainter Mercury, the smallest planet of the solar system. On opposition night Uranus will be closest to Earth for this year — at a distance of 1.73 billion miles, 2.79 billion km, or 155 light-minutes. Uranus' minimum distance from Earth will boost its brightness to magnitude 5.62. It will also appear slightly larger — showing a 3.8 arc-seconds-wide disk in telescopes for a week or so centered on opposition night.

Here’s an early morning sight you won’t want to miss. The return of Sirius and the winter constellations to the morning sky heralds a change of season. Chart via John Jardine Goss/ EarthSky. In a telescope, the planet will display a half-illuminated phase and an apparent disk diameter of 22 arc-seconds. With each passing day, Venus will slowly increase in illuminated phase, shrink in size, and diminish in brightness. In late August and early September, look for two hints of the changing season in the predawn sky: Orion the Hunter and Sirius the Dog Star. Recognizable for the short straight line of three stars that make up his Belt, Orion rises before dawn at this time of year. And the sky’s brightest star, Sirius – also known as the Dog Star, as it’s part of the constellation Canis Major the Greater Dog – follows Orion into the sky as the predawn darkness gives way to dawn.

Never miss a shooting star

Algol normally shines at magnitude 2.1, similar to the nearby star Almach (aka Gamma Andromedae). But while fully dimmed, Algol's brightness of magnitude 3.4 is almost identical to Rho Persei (or Gorgonea Tertia or ρ Per), the star sitting just two finger widths to Algol's lower right (or 2.25 degrees to the celestial south). The planet will be setting in the west before 11 p.m. local time at month's end, but the earlier sunsets of autumn will deliver several hours of excellent evening viewing all month long. On Nov. 4, Saturn's westward retrograde motion through the stars of central Aquarius will slow to a stop as it completes a retrograde loop that began in June. It will spend the rest of November ramping up its eastward trek and slightly decreasing its 24-degree separation from Neptune to its east. In fact, if you've been an early riser, it's quite possible you might have stumbled across Mercury on your own. Since Nov. 6, it has been rising at least 90 minutes before sunrise, which is also just about the same time that morning twilight is beginning. If you scan low along the east-southeast horizon about 45 minutes before sunrise, Mercury has been visible as a distinctly bright, yellowish-orange "star." The very best views of Mercury, however, are taking place right now as it is currently rising some 100 minutes before the sun. This is even before the break of dawn, so for a short while at least, Mercury will be visible against a completely dark sky.

As was noted from the onset, Mercury always appears from our Earthly vantage point to be in the same general direction as the sun. Thus, relatively few people have set eyes on it; there is even a story — possibly apocryphal — that the great Polish astronomer Copernicus never saw it! November 20 – After sunset on November 20, look toward the south to see the first quarter moon just below Ringed Planet Saturn. The pair are joined by bright stars Fomalhaut and Altair. The James Webb Space Telescope, which launched on Christmas Day, has successfully deployed its sunshield and mirror panels. It is now on its way out to the point in space where it will begin operations, some 1.5 million km (1 million miles) away from Earth – around four times further away than the Moon! German text, "Beim frühen Morgenlicht," thought to date from around 1800 (perhaps even the mid-1700s). The German text was first published in Sebastian Portner's Katholisches Gesangbuch (1828) in fourteen stanzas of couplets with a refrain line.

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One night, while George was running a public night at the Brooklyn College Observatory in New York, the telescope was pointed right at Venus which — as now — was then displaying its delicate crescent shape. Yet one student gazing through the telescope eyepiece stubbornly insisted he was not looking at Venus, but at the moon instead. When George commented that the moon wasn't even in the sky, the student replied, "So what? Doesn't a telescope show you things you can't see without it?" Bottom line: A sign of the changing season is the return of Sirius before sunup. Be the first from your latitude to see Sirius in the morning sky. On November evenings, the Andromeda Galaxy is positioned very high in the eastern sky. (Image credit: Chris Vaughan/Starry Night) Over the month, Saturn's brightness will diminish a little from magnitude 0.7 to 0.85. Viewed in a telescope during November Saturn will show an apparent disk diameter of 17.4 arc-seconds, and its rings will span nearly 41 arc-seconds.