Sky watch: The Pleiades, winter harbingers

Whenever I spot the constellation Taurus, the bull, rising in the east shortly after dark, I know that winter can't be far behind.

Stargazers might be able to trace the stars of Taurus into the outline of a bull's head and long horns, with the star Aldebaran marking its fiery red eye.

Aldebaran, along with bright stars Antares, Regulus and Fomalhaut, was one of the four "Royal Stars" of ancient Persia. Surrounding it, we can easily notice a V-shaped grouping of stars known to astronomers as the Hyades.

In the lore of the ancients -- from Greece all the way to China -- the Hyades has been associated with wet and stormy weather; the name is said to come from an archaic Greek word meaning "to rain."

Only 150 light years away, the Hyades forms the nearest open star cluster to Earth and may be only about 660 million years old. Though it appears that Aldebaran is part of this cluster, it's actually less than half that distance from us.

Riding on the back of Taurus appears a tiny grouping of stars that many people misidentify as the Little Dipper. It's really a cluster named the Pleiades, more commonly known as the Seven Sisters.

The Pleiades lay less than 400 light years away and may be only between 50 and 100 million years old -- a veritable cosmic youngster. On a dark winter night, look carefully to see how many stars you can count there; you should be able to find six or seven by looking not directly at the cluster but by casting your gaze slightly off to its side.

sights in all the heavens.