Northern Sky: August 6 - 19

Deane Morrison is a science writer at the University of Minnesota, where she authors the Minnesota Starwatch column.

The Perseid meteor shower peaking on August 12, with a chance of an ‘earth grazer’; the Persied’s parent comet – Swift-Tuttle; August’s full moon on the 18^th; Mars gliding through the crown of Scorpius August 6-11; and in the West, Bootes, the Herdsman.

Dark skies for starwatching around the new moon on August 2; Scorpius low in the south with Mars and Saturn; an asterism - the teapot of Sagittarius; this episodes challenge constellation: Ophiuchus, the snake handler; and the summer triangle, high in the east and moving westward.

(photo by Nick Ares via Wikimedia Commons)