Our Programs…

… are on clear Friday and Saturday nights from March - Late November. Watch the main page. By noon on the day of each program we post a forecast and a note on whether or not the program that evening will go forward.

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September 3-4:   Cosmic Rings.   Dying stars at the end of their lives will often blow a smoke ring that is visible through our telescopes.  Come explore a few of them with us. 8:00 PM

September 11-12: The Archer and the Scorpion. With the Milky Way at its best, come see two of the most distinct constellations in the direction of its beating heart.  7:45 PM

September 18-19: Saturn Rises, Venus Sets. The most popular sight in the heavens, Saturn, will be rising over the trees in the East this evening as it gets dark.   Come learn about this amazing world and its huge retinue of moons. Also Venus is at its brightest.  7:45 PM

September 25: Harvest Moon. The first full moon after the fall equinox is traditionally known in the West as “The Harvest Moon”. Come see its lovely glow as it rises in the east this weekend, and see how it gives far more light than one would think. 7:15 PM

 
September 26:  SPECIAL EVENT: Cosmic Concert.
Join JGAP and the Hocking Valley Community Orchestra for an evening of music and stars.  This is a fundraiser to help support the HHCO and the programs we do at JGAP. 6:00 PM, concert at 7:00 PM

October 2-3: The Andromeda Galaxy. The most distant object visible to the unaided eye is a tiny, blurry, blob of light in the constellation Andromeda. That small blob is the largest galaxy in our local group, a collection of nearly a trillion stars 2.5 million light years away. 7:15 PM

October 9-10: Dark Fall Skies. Early fall in Ohio often has the clearest skies. This weekend, with no moon, the stars will be gloriously clear. Come explore the celestial wonders along the Milky Way with us. 7:00 PM

October 16-17: The Vain Queen. The story of the vain Queen Cassiopeia is one of the many Greek myths enshrined in the traditional western constellations. Come learn her tale, and join us to view some of the many, lovely star clusters in the celestial figure named for her. 6:45 PM

October 23-24: The Color of Moonlight. Do you see moonlight as grey, white, a silvery blue? Come learn the true colors of moonlight as we gaze upon it rising over our plaza. Also, Saturn will be well placed for observation. 6:45 PM

October 30-31: The Horse and the Foal. The giant Pegasus, the winged horse, and its foal, Equuleus, are rising high in the evening at the end of October. This part of the sky looks out upon galaxies and a stunning globular cluster, M15. 6:30 PM

November 6-7: The Goat and the Water Carrier. Two zodiacal constellations grace the southern skies at this time of year: Capricornus and Aquarius. Looking into this region of space we encounter galaxies, a few glittering globular clusters, and a nebula known informally as “The Eye of God.” 5:30 PM EST

November 13-14: Earthshine. The thin crescent moon holds a wondrous sight, a pale glow which some call “Da Vinci Glow” after Leonardo DaVinci, who explained it. Also, Saturn is at its best this month. 5:15 PM EST

November 20-21: Rugged Moon, Ringed Saturn. The bright gibbous moon and the ringed planet Saturn rise together this weekend. Both are amongst the most eye-catching sights in our telescopes. 5:15 PM EST

View of the Month:   
Jupiter

The most common astronomical question I’m getting right now (February 2026) is “what is that bright star high in the east?”

If it’s early evening, and it’s still late winter or early spring of 2026, the answer is almost certainly “Jupiter.”

The largest planet in our solar system, Jupiter could fit over 1320 Earths inside its volume (if you crushed the rocks down and filled in all the spaces). However, Jupiter is not made of rock (at least not much rock). It is, instead, nearly all hydrogen, helium, and an assortment of other gasses.

In other words, Jupiter is all clouds.

And it is the brown grey, orange and red-ish colors of those clouds that we see when we look through an amateur telescope at high power.

Each band of clouds represents a region where the winds are going more or less the same direction and speed around the planet. The light color bands tend to go one way (relative to the bulk of the planet) and the dark bands go the other.

At the intersection of those two winds, gigantic eddies form. But the word “eddies” sells them short. These “tiny” oval blobs are, in fact, continent sized hurricanes whipped up by the difference in wind speed between the two adjacent regimes. The grandest of these eddies, is the giant, cannabalistic, Great Red Spot, a bit larger than the Earth.

The Great Red Spot (GRS to its friends) can often be made out as a pale, deep orange, blob when the correct side of Jupiter is facing us. If the GRS is not in view, you don’t have to wait too long for it to appear again. A “day” on Jupiter is just under 10 hours. If you can’t see it, you don’t have to wait much longer than 5 hours for it to come back around again. (By which time Jupiter may have set, alas)

Deep in the heart of Jupiter, beneath many thousands of miles of compressed liquid, metallic hydrogen (the pressure is so great, it turns the gas into a dense liquid), there may be a residue material left over from the planet’s formation which could plausibly be called “rock” if it were not for the fact that it glows at temperatures hotter than the surface of the sun.