What's Up in the Night Sky

November 2025 - Vol. 29, No. 11

This Month's Night Sky - NOTE: The next paragraph describes the sky as it appears at 10 pm EST (11 pm EDT) near mid- month. The sky also looks this way at 11 pm EST (midnight EDT) during the beginning of the month and at 9 pm EST (10 pm EDT) by month's end.

If you are blessed with a dark observing site, the Orion arm of the Milky Way (the galaxy we inhabit) arches overhead from horizon to horizon. Embedded are the stars of constellations Cassiopeia, denoted by its familiar "W" or Sigma asterism, and Perseus. The Summer Triangle finally disappears early in the West before midnight. Although there are no bright stars due South, red Aldebaran and the Pleiades asterism inTaurus, as well as yellow Capella (Auriga) glow in the southeast. Later follows the twins, Castor and Pollux (Gemini), and the hour-glass asterism of constellation Orion with fuzzy M-42 (Great Orion Nebula) just below its three "belt" stars, that heralds the coming of winter.

MERCURY, continues the best evening apparition for observers in the southern hemisphere. Mercury reaches inferior conjunction on the 20th, reappearing in the morning sky at month's end. VENUS, shines in the morning twilight, becoming harder to view. MARS, visible in the evening twilight, is approaching the end of its 2024/2025 opposition. JUPITER rises before midnight, shining at -2.5 magnitude by month's end. SATURN will be well over the horizon at sunset. The ring system is close to edge-on as viewed from Earth, reaching -.04 separation in the second half of the month. URANUS is up all night as it reaches opposition on the 21st. NEPTUNE will be located in the constellation of Pisces during the evening. (You'll need a telescope to observe Neptune.)

Review how to determine Angular Measurement.

Calendar of Events

NOTE: For those observers not in the ET zone, convert the calendar times to your zone's time by subtracting one hour for CT, two for MT and three for PT. Don't forget to adjust for Daylight Savings Time when necessary by subtracting one hour from your planisphere's time. Dawn and dusk times must also be corrected. See your local newspaper, TV news, or cable TV's Weather Channel for sunrise and sunset times or check with the U.S. Naval observatory. Unfortunately some of these events may occur during daylight hours in your area.

DATE	EVENT
02	Daylight savings time (DST) ends for affected areas. Saturn 4 deg. S. of Moon. Neptune 3 deg. S. of Moon.
05	S. Taurid meteor peak. The South Taurid shower can generate up to 10 meteors per hour. It originates from the periodic comet, Encke. November's full moon is often called the "Frost or Freezing Moon" as well as the "Beaver Moon". The Moon is at perigee, and November's full moon will be called, the "Beaver Supermoon".
06	Moon 0.8 deg. N. of the Pleiades star cluster (M-45).
09	Mercury stationary.
10	Jupiter 4 deg. S. of Moon.
11	Moon 1.7 deg. N. of the Beehive cluster (M-44). Jupiter stationary.
12	N. Taurid meteor peak. The North Taurid meteor peak produces up to 15 meteors per hour. The North Taurid shower originated from the asteroid 2004 TG10 that is possibly a large fragment of comet Encke. Mercury 1.3 deg. S of Mars.
13	Alpha Leonis, Regulus, 1.0 deg. S. of Moon, occultation from N. Greenland, NE Russia, most of Alaska, N Japan.
17	Alpha Virginis, Spica, 1.2 deg. N. of Moon, occultation from S. tip of S. America and W. Antarctica. Leonids meteor shower produces up to 20 meteors per hour, originating from the periodic comet Tempel–Tuttle. The moon rises well after midnight as a waning crescent.
20	Moon at apogee. Mercury at inferior conjunction.
21	Uranus at opposition.
23	Mercury at perihelion.
25	Pluto, 0.4 deg. S. of Moon, occultation from Cape Verde Is., most of Africa, most of Arabian Peninsula, S. Asia, and parts of Kazakhstan.
29	Mercury stationary. Saturn stationary. Saturn 4 deg. S. of Moon.
30	Neptune 3 deg. S. of Moon.

Lunar Almanac for November 2025

Phases of the Moon	Phase and Date(s)	Best viewed before local midnight
	New 20	Deep Space Objects
	1st. Qtr 28	Planets & Moon
	Full 05	Moon
	Last Qtr 12	Deep Space & Planets

Topic of the month: Taurus, the Bull

Night falls quickly for North Americans as the autumn's evening skies darken after sunset. The constellation of Taurus rises quickly, and crosses the sky all night. Taurus is an ecliptic constellation that has been associated with a bull. The bull shape is rather enigmatic to some, for although constellation maps may show horns, it is difficult to see more than one leg with the face of the bull as it charges across the sky. The first magnitude star Aldebaran marks the eye of the bull, nestled in a triangular shaped group of stars that forms the "face" of the bull. The triangular face of the bull is a very important star cluster, the Hyades. The center of this cluster has been measured by astronomers to be located about 150 light years away from the Earth. The fiery eye of Aldebaran is not a member of the cluster, but resides about midway between our Sun and the Hyades center.

constellation of taurus the bull — Constellation of Taurus the Bull

+ + Astra featured the Hyades cluster in February 2016, What's Up in the Night Sky topic.

Taurus lies across the winter Milky Way from the constellation of Gemini. It contains two famous open star clusters, the Pleiades (M-45), and the previously mentioned Hyades star cluster. The Pleiades cluster is also known as the seven sisters, although only 6 of its estimated 250 stars are bright enough to be seen with the naked eye. Nevertheless, it is the brightest star cluster in our sky. The Pleiades cluster is probably about 445 light-years away from Earth. Taurus contains another famous object, the Crab Nebula (M-1). The nebula is a supernova remnant that contains a type of star called, a pulsar of 16th magnitude.

Taurus will cross the sky until next May, carrying the seven sisters and the head of the bowl from the eastern sky to the western sky, until the Bull plunges into the sunset horizon.

--See You Under the Stars!
Astra for Astra's Almanac

The star chart above was generated by Stellarium, a free open source planetarium program. The above image was created by Dawn Jenkins, using Stellarium and graphic editing programs to format the image for this web page. Editing was done for educational purposes only. Stellarium offers much more to amateur astronomers and is being used in planetariums and to guide telescopes in the field. Simple charts like the one above can be used on the internet for non-profit, illustration purposes. Proper credit is due of course! Thank you to the makers of this fine program from Astra's Star Gate.