Tour June's Sky! | May 28th, 2010

If you love to savor the night sky, June is a minimalist month. For those of us living north of the equator, nights are short and evening twilight doesn’t end until 9 p.m. or later.

But even if you can't stay up late, the evening sky offers three bright planets to view. Dazzling Venus is well up in the west. Higher and to its left is peach-colored Mars, and look a little further east to spot creamy-white Saturn.

Around midmonth, Venus lines up with the stars Pollux and Castor a bit to its right. Then, by the end of June you’ll see that the three planets, plus the star Regulus, will be equally spaced across a wide swath of the evening sky.

Meanwhile, look nearly overhead to spot Arcturus, the third brightest star in the nighttime sky.

Get these great skywatching tips and many more by downloading June's audio sky tour. It's an 5-megabyte MP3 file that runs 5½ minutes long.