Hyades Cluster
A large V-shaped open star cluster in Taurus, the nearest open cluster to Earth, easily visible to the naked eye and surrounding the star Aldebaran (which is not a member).
Open cluster in Taurus. Magnitude 0.5.
Can you see it from Guyana?
From Georgetown (6.8° N) it climbs to 81° above the northern horizon at its highest; from Lethem (3.4° N), to 78° above the northern horizon. It is highest at midnight on the night of 25 Nov, in the middle of its season. The page works out tonight's rise, highest point and set for both towns in Guyana time (UTC-4), and where the Moon is.
What you'll see
- Your eyes: Plain to the eye even from Georgetown: a V of stars around Aldebaran (which is not a member).
- 10x50 binoculars: The whole V fills the field; many double stars.
- A small telescope (80 to 100 mm): Far too big for a telescope; binoculars or the eye.
- A camera: Spans about 40% of an APS-C frame at 85 mm (field 15.7° × 10.5°); a tracker helps.
How big, how bright, how far
- Size on the sky: 329′, 11 Moons across (the Moon is about 31′ wide).
- Brightness: magnitude 0.5. Brighter than the faintest stars Georgetown shows (4.3), and Lethem's (6.0).
- Distance: 153 light-years. The light reaching your eye left it about 150 years ago, around the year 1880.
Apparent size from OpenNGC (Mattia Verga), CC-BY-SA-4.0.
What it is made of
- Type
- Open Cluster
- Distance
- Approx. 153 Lightyears
- True size
- Approx. 60 Lightyears diameter
- Main Sequence Stars (A, F, G, K type): Hundreds of stars, similar age and motion
- Red Giants: Evolved stars within the cluster
More deep-sky objects: Pleiades (M45) · Open Cluster M36 · Open Cluster M38 · Open Cluster M35 · Open Cluster M37 · Christmas Tree Cluster & Cone Nebula (NGC 2264)