July brings spectacular views of three planets before sunrise. Saturn’s golden hue is back for viewing and is currently best seen between midnight and dawn. It’s brightness will grow until it reaches peak illumination on Sun., Oct. 4.

Early July, Mars and Uranus made a striking pair in the pre-dawn hours, the reddish tint of Mars contrasting with the pale green of Uranus. Both planets currently straddle the western horn of Taurus. Uranus is telescopically visible towards the sparkling Pleiades and Mars shines north-east of the bull’s red eye, the star, Aldebaran.

On Sun., July 26, Saturn moves into retrograde motion. Although planetary retrograde motion is frequently associated with a time of havoc, usually in reference to Mercury, this habitual contrary motion of the planets was even recognized by the ancients.

What had puzzled early astronomers, who thought planets moved in uniform motion, is explained by knowing each planet orbits at different speeds. Mercury moves fastest around the sun and laps the Earth on its travels. Then, from our Earthly perspective, Mercury briefly appears to move “backwards” against the stars. With Saturn much further away, Earth is the speedier planet, and Saturn spends a longer period seeming to move in reverse direction. Much like a car moving faster than another one lane over, the car being passed appears to go backwards, although both cars maintain their forward momentum.