Ceres

As mentioned a week ago, the night sky attracts. It has so many moving things up there, boredom is impossible. Although I've made a few feeble attempts to capture comet Panstarrs in the pre-dawn moments, it’s clear that as far south as it is, waiting till the first week of March might allow us of the northern hemisphere to bag it after sunset.

In the meantime, I’m looking for a personal first. I have yet to capture an asteroid and Ceres, the big one, currently hangs near beta-Tauri. Since that star is in a relatively dark starless field, it should be simple to locate. For anyone who hasn’t ever done comet or asteroid hunting the basic rule of thumb is: know your night sky! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceres_%28dwarf_planet%29

That means get out there and look, and look, and look. Don’t just say, “OK there’s Elnath (beta-Tauri)”; get familiar with whatever other stars are in the field. With 10x50 binoculars you will see up to ninth or tenth magnitude. So there will be other stars in the apparently dark area around Elnath.

http://www.constellation-guide.com/constellation-list/taurus-constellation/taurus-constellation-map/

The next rule, after you are familiar with the star sprinkles around Elnath, be sure to get outside several times in the next few days. You can only see a moving object if you see it move. Since asteroids are not meteors that flash by, it may take three or four nights to realize that one of the points of light around Elnath has moved.

To be sure that you’ve captured Ceres, continue looking up for several more nights to watch it catch up to Elnath in the first week of March.   

To be sure that you’ve captured Ceres, continue looking up for several more nights to watch it catch up to Elnath.