SkyEye

The Calendar

Mercury's best morning apparition of 2023 occurs this month and next for observers in equatorial and southern latitudes. The red planet makes a fine telescope object on 5 February when it passes just 0.2° north of the globular cluster M22.

The Solar System

The word planet is derived from the Greek word for 'wanderer'. Unlike the background stars, planets seem to move around the sky, keeping mostly to a narrow track called the ecliptic, the path of the Sun across the stars. Dwarf planets and small solar-system bodies, including comets, are not so constrained, often moving far above or below the ecliptic.

Sun Capricornus → Aquarius

Mercury Sagittarius → Capricornus

This morning apparition of Mercury is the best of the year for observers in southern latitudes and the worst for planet watchers in northern temperate regions. The tiny planet resumes direct motion (in right ascension) on the third day of the month and attains the largest greatest elongation west (26.3°) this year on 16 February. The last day of the month finds Mercury at the first of four aphelia in 2022.

Venus Sagittarius

Venus reaches its maximum brightness for this morning apparition, −4.6, early this month. The first of two meetings with Mars occurs in dawn skies on 16 February. Look for the morning star in the east before sunrise, high in the sky for early risers in the southern hemisphere but very low for observers in northern temperate latitudes.

Earth and Moon

The waxing crescent Moon occults sixth-magnitude Uranus on 7 February.

Mars Sagittarius

Mars is found in the morning sky, best viewed from southern latitudes where it rises well ahead of the dawn. It moves past the globular cluster M22 on the fifth day of the month and appears 6° south of dazzling Venus on 16 February. An equinox occurs on Mars on 24 February, bringing spring to its southern hemisphere and autumn to the north.

Jupiter Aquarius

Jupiter is becoming increasingly difficult to see in the western skies as it sets deeper and deeper in twilight. It vanishes before the end of the month, with conjunction occurring in early March.

Saturn Capricornus

Saturn is at conjunction early this month and is lost in the glare of the Sun. It reappears in the morning sky late in February.

Uranus Aries

The waxing crescent Moon occults Uranus on 7 February but you'll need to be in the Antarctic to see it. The sixth-magnitude object is visible in the evening and is best viewed from northern latitudes where it doesn't set until around midnight.

Neptune Aquarius

A small telescope is always necessary to view the most distant planet in the solar system. As it approaches conjunction in March, Neptune is setting during twilight by the end of the month and is lost to view.