Puppis, resembles the shape of a Poop deck, when stars in this constellation are imaginarily connected!
Where should I see…
Canis Major, Columba and Pictor are the constellations towards west of Puppis constellation. If you
move your eyes towards east, you will see another constellation named Vela, Pyxis and Hydra. In the North and South of Puppis, you will find Monoceros and Carina constellations respectively. Puppis is halfway between celestial equator and South Pole, and so is fully part of Southern Hemisphere.
It covers up 673 square degree area of the sky. Area wise it is 20th largest constellation in the sky.
When and What can I see…
We can gaze at this poop deck shape of Puppis constellation from September to May, as seen from
India.
All you need is your naked eyes other than clear skies to see 269 stars of this constellations, as they are the one which are brighter than the lower limit of our naked eyes (i.e. 6.5 apparent magnitude) to see faintest stars.. The brightest star of this constellation is Naos.
Constellations are made up of single, binary (apparent and absolute), multiple and variable stars. Out of total 269 stars of different types, here is the list of 20 brightest stars as per their nature:
| Binary / Multiple Star system |
Variable Stars |
Binary/multiple and Variable Stars |
Single stars |
| Azmidi |
4 |
Tureis |
Naos |
| 3 |
– |
2 |
8 |
| 4 |
4 |
3 |
9 |
Mythology stories…
As per Hindu mythology, there are no such known stories for this constellation.
Deep Sky Objects…
M46 or NGC 2437 || Open Cluster
M47 or NGC 2422 || Open Cluster
M93 or NGC 2447 || Open Cluster
All the stars that we see naked eyes, all belong to our own, Milky way galaxy (Akash Ganga Tara Vishv). Bright stars can be seen naked eye and faint one through telescope. But the curtain of sky that we see in 2D is actually a huge universe we are talking about, with 3 dimension. There are many nebulous objects visible in every constellations. They differ widely by distances and nature. Like Emission Nebula, Reflecting Nebula, Absorption Nebula, Star Birth Nebula, Supernova Remnants (SNR) and Open Starscluster which are within the disk of our own Milky Way galaxy. Globular cluster are also found, which are in the halo of our galaxy and some most distant objects like galaxies are also visible through telescope. Such objects are defined as “Deep Sky Objects”.
In this constellation there are 64 such different types of Deep Sky Objects observed. Below is the list of 20 brightest Deep Sky Objects:
NGC 2438 || Planetary Nebula
NGC 2439 || Open Cluster
NGC 2509 || Open cluster
| |
Galaxy |
Open Cluster |
Globular Cluster |
Nebula |
Supernova Remnant |
|
| Naked eye visibility |
– |
M47 |
– |
– |
– |
|
| M46 |
|
| M93 |
|
| 4 |
|
| Visible through Telescope |
– |
13 |
– |
– |
– |
|
|
|
| |
– |
20 |
– |
– |
– |
|
