It is the week of ghosts and goblins lurking in the night sky if you let your imagination go wild.

There's also signs of Halloween in the night sky. I want to show you some tricks to find some of the great treats in the sky.

The following is a list of some of my favorites this haunted time of year. You might want to pull out the full October star map from my Oct. 4 column, or if it's already long gone in the recycle bin or the bottom of your bird cage, you can pull the star map up from my Web site at www.lynchandthestars.com.

Arcturus

This is a good Halloween star because of its orange pumpkin color that's easily seen early in the evening.

As soon as it's dark enough, look for it just above the low west-northwest horizon. Astronomically, Arcturus is an orange-red star 37 light-years away, bloating out as it nears the end of its life. Remember, one light-year equals almost six trillion miles.

Andromeda galaxy

This ghostly image will require binoculars or a small telescope to see unless you're well out in the countryside far from city lights. But even then, it will appear as a tiny faint cloud patch.

The Andromeda galaxy — the next door neighbor to our own Milky Way galaxy — is a mere 2.5 million light-years away and is perched in the eastern evening sky.

As you see in the diagram, it's above the constellation Andromeda, which is attached to the great square of the constellation Pegasus the winged horse.

Milky Way band

All of the stars we see in the night sky are part of our Milky Way galaxy, but if you're lucky enough to be celestial trick-or-treating away from heavy city lighting, you'll see that ghostly band of light running roughly from the northern horizon, through the zenith, onto the southern horizon.

This band is made up of the combined light of billions of stars, as we gaze into the direction of the plane of the 100,000 light-year diameter disk-shaped spiral of stars we call our own home galaxy.

My favorite Milky Way lore comes from Native American tribes. They considered the band to be the collective light of the campfires of souls taking a break for the night on their way to heaven.

Pleiades star cluster

This is my favorite, favorite Halloween treat in the sky. Anyone can see it no matter how much city light you have, unless maybe you're in some kind of super bright megastore parking lot.

Just look in the low east-northeastern sky a little later in the evening this week after about 9 p.m., and you'll spot it as it's on the rise.

Many cultures of old believed when that cluster of stars reached its highest point in the night sky this time of year that disasters, wars, plagues or whatever was soon to follow.

The Pleiades also are called the "Seven Little Sisters Cluster," because according to Greek mythology, these seven stars represented the seven weeping daughters of the old god Atlas, who was being forced by newer gods like Zeus and others to hold the whole world up on his shoulders.

Even though it's called the Seven Little Sisters, there's really only six stars of the cluster you can easily see with the naked eye. With a pair of binoculars or a small telescope, you can see many, many more stars that make for some serious eye candy.

Astronomically, the Pleiades is a cluster of young stars that formed together about 100,000 years ago and is a little more than 400 light-years from Earth.

Mars

If you're really out for a full night of Halloween chills and thrills, look for a Halloween orange-red color, moderately bright, starlike object on the rise in the low eastern sky.

That's the planet Mars, which is on its way for another close encounter with Earth early next year. Actually, it's more accurate to say Mars and the Earth will be approaching each other in the next few months as they sling around the sun in their own individual orbits. Right now, Mars and Earth are separated by a little more than 113 million miles, but by late January, Mars will be less than 67 million miles away. I'll have more on that in future Starwatch columns.

Jupiter and the moon

This celestial treat is a one-night-only special Monday night. You can't miss this one.

Even before it's totally dark, look for the waxing gibbous, football-shaped moon right next to the bright planet Jupiter in the southeastern sky in a big cosmic hug. They're separated by only three degrees in the sky.

With a small telescope or even a pair of binoculars, you can easily make out the disk of the largest planet in our solar system, and maybe even a few of its horizontal cloud bands of methane, sulfur and ammonia. For sure you should be able to see some Jupiter's brighter Galilean moons that resemble tiny stars in a line on either side of the great planet.

On Monday evening, Jupiter will be just less than 437 million miles away. Be sure to see this celestial hugging tomorrow night because through the rest of the week the moon will move farther and farther to the east of Jupiter.

Have a wonderful, spooky Halloween week. Watch out for flying broomsticks!

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and is author of the book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web site www.lynchandthestars.com.

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