This spectacular photograph by Alan Dyer of Alberta, Canada captured Venus’ swing past the Pleiades Star Cluster, or the Seven Sisters, on Tuesday, April 3, 2012. The image, spanning about two fingers widths of the sky, nicely shows the mini-dipper shape of the stars that you would see through binoculars. Alan’s original blog post is…
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The relatively bright galaxy named NGC 2903 sits in front of Leo, the Lion’s nose, just below the reddish star Alterf. The magnitude 9 spiral galaxy is visible in medium-sized telescope under dark sky conditions. End-to-end the galaxy spans 11 arc-minutes, or one-third of the full moon’s diameter! While it didn’t make Charles Messier’s List,…
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This wonderful image was captured around 8:30 pm EST on Saturday, February 11, 2023 by Andrea Girones from her backyard in Ottawa, Canada. It shows the green comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) as it slid past reddish Mars. The dusty tail is material left behind as the comet travels downwards (celestial southbound) in the sky. The…
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This spectacular image of the Pleiades Star Cluster (Messier 45) in Taurus was captured and processed by Shawn Nielsen of Kitchener, Ontario. Notice both the bright blues of reflection nebulosity and the darker dust in the background. Shawn posts his images on social media as @Visible Dark_ . His website https://visibledark.ca/ contains many more treasures.…
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