June sky highlights - Venus Shines before dawn

Both inner planets gather in June's morning sky. Mercury and, in particular, Venus put on fine displays as twilight commences. The warm evenings typical of June offer great conditions to show off the solar system's most beautiful planet, Saturn. Go ahead and invite some neighbors over for their first view of the ringed planet through a telescope. Meanwhile, the overnight hours belong to Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto.

As darkness falls, one lone planet graces the star-filled sky. Saturn stands more than one-third of the way from the southwestern horizon to the zenith shortly after sunset. It sets shortly before 2 a.m. in early June and by midnight at month's end.