Mars culminates at around 9 pm during early February and one hour earlier at the end of the month. At culminations it is directly overhead and is the best time to look for it. The red planet residing in Taurus constellation shines at a magnitude of -0.6 in early Feb. consequently losing its brightness to +0.2 at the end of the month It’s a little less than 1 A.U. away from Earth and as we recede from this planet, it looks smaller and smaller on your eyepiece.

Mariner 10 flew past Mercury three times in 1974 and 1975 but because the same hemisphere was in sunlight during each encounter it was able to image less than half the planet. After  more than 30 years we have new pictures of the planet missed out by Mariner 10.

On January 14, 2008, the MESSENGER spacecraft observed about half of the hemisphere missed by Mariner 10. This image was snapped by the Wide Angle Camera, about 80 minutes after MESSENGER's closest approach to Mercury, when the spacecraft was at a distance of about 27,000 kilometers. The image shows features as small as 10 kilometers in size.

Comet 8/P Tuttle has joined Comet 17/P Holmes to make the night more jolly. Watch for this comet when it is the closest -- only about 37.8 million kilometers away.

The International Meteor Organization reports a prediction by Peter Jenniskens and his team at SETI Institute of possible outburst of Ursids this year on December 22nd. The shower will be at its peak at around 1:45 am - 3 am Nepal Standard Time on the night of 22-23, the best timing for any meteor shower for Nepalis. This shower has remained quiet for long, but might leave an impression this year.