March opens with Venus and Mercury visible in the evening sky, along with a delicate crescent Moon. Neptune is nearby but likely not visible in twilight, even with optical aid. Credit: Astronomy: Roen Kelly
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Friday, February 28
Venus is a prominent fixture in the evening sky, still hanging on at magnitude –4.8 and setting nearly three hours after the Sun. It’s currently located in central Pisces, far outshining any stars in the region.
Because Venus is an inferior planet closer to the Sun than Earth, it goes through phases as seen from our planet. The best way to view its phase is through a telescope not long after the Sun has set — the brighter background sky actually reduces the glare of the bright planet and makes its shape easier to see. Venus is currently a delicate crescent just 15 percent lit Despite its thin phase, however, its disk is a a hefty 49” across in apparent width, thanks to its close proximity.
Hanging below Venus is Mercury. The solar system’s smallest planet is also bright — magnitude –1.1 — but it is close to the Sun, hanging just 8.5° high 30 minutes after sunset. Mercury also undergoes phases and through a telescope, its tiny, 6”-wide disk appears just over three-quarters lit. It’s a stark contrast with Venus.
Just below Mercury is the tiny sliver of our one-day-old Moon. Long after both have set tonight, the Moon will pass 0.4° south of Mercury at 11 P.M. EST.
Sunrise: 6:34 A.M.
Sunset: 5:51 P.M.
Moonrise: 7:01 A.M.
Moonset: 6:55 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (1%)
*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40° N 90° W. The Moon’s illumination is given at 12 P.M. local time from the same location.
Saturday, March 1
The Moon moves into Pisces this morning and passes 1.6° north of Neptune at 4 A.M. EST. By 6 P.M. EST, our satellite then passes 6° south of Venus. The Moon also reaches perigee, the closest point to Earth in its orbit, at 4:21 P.M. EST. Out satellite will then sit 224,914 miles (361,964 kilometers) away.
The now-6-percent-illuminated crescent Moon lies to Venus’ lower left in the evening sky as the two slowly sink in the west after sunset. Below them, Mercury is fainter than Venus but still quite bright and obvious to the naked eye; to capture Neptune, you’ll need binoculars or a telescope. The distant ice giant is magnitude 7.8 and sits 2° southeast (to the upper left) of Mercury tonight.
Above Pisces — where Neptune, Venus, and the Moon are all located — is the sparse, faint constellation Aries the Ram. Its two brightest stars are Hamal, the constellation’s magnitude 2 alpha star, and Sheratan, its magnitude 2.6 beta star. As Aries sets this evening, Sheratan appears to hang directly below Hamal.
Although it has no proper name, magnitude 4.6 Epsilon (ε) Arietis is a lovely double star worth viewing. You’ll find it some 12° east of Hamal. The two components are nearly the same magnitude — 5.2 and 5.6 — and appear yellow and white to most observers’ eyes. They are currently about 1.4” apart. Smaller scopes (4 inches) can split them, but good conditions are needed. Larger scopes should have an easier time.
Sunrise: 6:33 A.M.
Sunset: 5:52 P.M.
Moonrise: 7:26 A.M.
Moonset: 8:11 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (4%)
Sunday, March 2
Early March is ideal for observers to try tracking down the zodiacal light. This faint glow comes from sunlight reflecting off a swath of tiny dust particles throughout the inner solar system, likely left there by comets as they pass through, spewing ices and dust.
At this time of year, the zodiacal light is visible after sunset, rising in the west up through Pisces — where bright Venus is located — and into Aries and even Taurus, where Jupiter currently resides. It appears after twilight fades as a cone-shaped glow widest at the base and thinnest at the tip. The zodiacal light is very faint, so you’ll need a dark observing site with no artificial lighting to the west. Getting to a higher-altitude site can also help clear the view as well.
Astrophotographers often capture the zodiacal light in nightscape images, as longer exposures can help to bring it out in a dark sky as well.
Sunrise: 6:31 A.M.
Sunset: 5:54 P.M.
Moonrise: 7:51 A.M.
Moonset: 9:28 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (10%)
Monday, March 3
Mars still dominates the constellation Gemini the Twins, high in the southeast an hour after sunset. The planet glows brightly at magnitude –0.2 and stands to the right of Pollux, the lower of Gemini’s two bright stars as the constellation is oriented in the early evening.
Syrtis Major is prominent on the martian disk as darkness falls across the Midwest tonight, rotating to the edge and then disappearing within just a few hours. This dark region is volcanic in origin and spans some 620 miles (1,000 km). Like many features on Mars, it isn’t static but appears to change as winds blow dust across the martian surface, altering the shape and albedo (reflectivity) of the feature.
Mars is now 11” wide and roughly 0.9 astronomical unit from Earth. (One astronomical unit, or AU, is the average Earth-Sun distance of 93 million miles [150 million km].) It is quickly receding as our orbits separate us, and the disk will measure just 9” within two weeks. So, early March is the best time to get good views of the Red Planet, particularly if you’re hunting down surface features.
Sunrise: 6:30 A.M.
Sunset: 5:55 P.M.
Moonrise: 8:18 A.M.
Moonset: 10:46 P.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (19%)
Tuesday, March 4
The Moon passes 5° north of Uranus at 11 P.M. EST, but if you want to hunt down this ice giant, you’re better off observing earlier in the evening, when it is higher in the sky.
The Moon is now in Aries, but Uranus is just over the border in far western Taurus. At magnitude 5.8, the faint planet is just at the edge of naked-eye visibility but will show up easily with a telescope or even binoculars. Wait until dark and find the waxing crescent Moon, sitting near a curve of stars in eastern Aries. Uranus is some 4.5° to the Moon’s left. Binoculars may pick up both in the same field of view (although you may also have to shift so the Moon is outside the field to see fainter Uranus), while telescopes should be slowly skimmed southeast of the Moon early in the evening to land on the faint planet a few fields of view over.
Above the pair is the lovely Pleiades open cluster — tomorrow, the Moon will hang between the Pleiades and Jupiter, so we’ll make sure to return and check out the scene.
Sunrise: 6:28 A.M.
Sunset: 5:56 P.M.
Moonrise: 8:50 A.M.
Moonset: —
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (29%)
Wednesday, March 5
The waxing Moon now sits between Jupiter and Pleiades, gracing the northwestern corner of Taurus.
Jupiter remains more than 60° high in the southwest around 7 P.M. local time. It’s the brightest point of light within Taurus and located to the upper left of the Moon and to the upper right of the red giant star Aldebaran. All four of the gas giant’s large Galilean moons are visible tonight through a telescope. Callisto sits alone to the planet’s east. To the west, Io is closest, with Europa farther out and Ganymede at the greatest distance from the planet.
Over the next few hours, you’ll see Europa moving closer to the planet while Io is moving farther away. The two moons pass each other just before 12:40 A.M. MST (early on the 6th; Jupiter has already set for observers farther east). As they do, Europa appears due north of Io. After that, Europa is the closest moon to the planet in the west, while Io continues to move farther away.
Sunrise: 6:26 A.M.
Sunset: 5:57 P.M.
Moonrise: 9:28 A.M.
Moonset: 12:04 A.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing crescent (40%)
Thursday, March 6
The Moon passes 6° north of Jupiter at 7 A.M. EST, a few hours before First Quarter Moon occurs at 11:32 A.M. EST.
This evening offers lunar observers located in North America the chance to catch a fleeting feature created as the shadows shift under the rising Sun. The famous Lunar X, sometimes called the Werner X, is a so-called clair-obscur effect that briefly appears just northwest of the crater Werner in the lunar south. It’s located roughly halfway between the Moon’s equator and south pole, right along where the terminator dividing night and day is located tonight.
Astronomy contributor Alister Ling recommends taking photos or video clips every five to 10 minutes over the course of the evening, which when strung together will reveal the X appearing and then disappearing again.
Sunrise: 6:25 A.M.
Sunset: 5:58 P.M.
Moonrise: 10:14 A.M.
Moonset: 1:19 A.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous (51%)
Friday, March 7
Early risers this morning can get a glimpse of one of the most famous planetary nebulae in the sky: M27, also called the Dumbbell Nebula.
Located in Vulpecula, M27 reaches an altitude of 40° above the eastern horizon an hour before sunrise. You can find it just over 3° north of magnitude 3.5 Gamma (γ) Sagittae, Sagitta’s brightest star.
At magnitude 7.4, the Dumbbell is one of the brightest planetaries in the sky. You can spot it with binoculars and even see that it its glow is slightly thinner in the middle than at the ends, like its namesake. A telescope will show this morphology even better, particularly at magnifications of 100x. A narrowband OIII filter will help even more.
At the center of the Dumbbell is the magnitude 13.5 white dwarf powering its glow. The nebula itself was once the outer layers of this star, which it blew off as it aged and now lights up from within.
Although M27 is visible in the mornings now, it will become a nighttime object in the summer. So, if you don’t like getting up early to observe, just wait a few months for it to move into the evening sky.
Sunrise: 6:23 A.M.
Sunset: 5:59 P.M.
Moonrise: 11:11 A.M.
Moonset: 2:26 A.M.
Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous (62%)
