Hobbies And Interests
Things You'll Need
Instructions
Purchase a copy of "Farmers' Almanac." This periodical, published every year, contains the locations in the sky of the visible planets for the entire year, given in a month-by-month summary in the middle of the booklet. You also may look online on sites such as wunderground.com, which can show you where the planets will be each night.
Buy a star chart or go online and access charts of the stars visible from where you live. These charts are going to allow you to learn the shapes and locations of a dozen constellations in which the planets will appear to pass through as they orbit the Sun.
Learn what the zodiac constellations look like so you will have points of reference when trying to locate a certain planet. All of the planets lie in a plane of orbit similar to the one that Earth has and appear to move against the night sky along a pathway that the zodiac constellations occupy. Think of the zodiac as a narrow circular path around the sky, forming a road that each planet will appear to travel on as it circles the Sun, seen from your vantage point on Earth, looking against the backdrop of the stars.
Use your almanac or online source to ascertain what constellation each planet is in on any given day. Find that constellation in the sky and then look for a bright object in it that is not one of the stars associated with the constellation. In dimmer constellations such as Cancer and Libra, the planet will stand out easily. In others such as Taurus or Gemini, you will need to use your star charts to determine what a bright star is and which the planet is.