Mercury reaches its greatest elongation, 26 degrees east of the sun on July 4. From latitude 40 degrees north, the +0.6-magnitude planet is low in the west-northwest and sets during twilight about 1.5 hours after sunset, and only an hour after the sun on July 12 when the planet will be of magnitude +1.2.

During July, magnitude 5.8 Uranus can be spotted as a blue-green speck in binoculars and as a small 3.5 arc-seconds-wide disk through any telescope. On July 4, the far brighter planet Venus will pass 2.4 degrees to the south of Uranus. On July 20, the waning crescent moon will shine near Uranus while making a passage through the Pleiades.

Nearly a week after Fourth of July fireworks illuminate the sky, the so-called Buck Moon will rise on July 10. The name dates back to the Maine Farmers’ Almanac, which assigned “Indian” names to full moons,