This small meteor shower can only be seen in the northern hemisphere, with between five and 10 meteors slipping across the sky every hour.
The bear cubs reach their peak on the evening of December 21, leading in the early hours of the morning of December 22. The moon will be 50% full. This, combined with the often cloudy winter nights of December, could obscure your view of this small shower.
If you want the best view of the shower, wait for the moon to set around 12:30 ET on December 22, according to NASA. Then watch the sky for about an hour.
The meteor shower comes from the constellation Ursa Minor, known as Little Carul, but the meteors will be visible in brightness across the sky.
Bears are a relatively new meteor shower, according to EarthSky.org’s SkySwatching guide. While many of the meteor showers we see throughout the year have been annual occurrences for centuries, bear cubs have only been observed in the 20th century.
Meteor rain happens when the Earth passes close to the orbit of 8P / Tuttle comet and this year, our close step includes several debris trails that follow this comet, according to the American Meteor Society. This could cause more activity during meteor showers.
Don’t look directly at the sky. The target is about half in the sky, according to the American Meteorological Society.
Also, the Geminid meteor shower is running until Sunday, and the winter solstice takes place a day later on December 21st.
And don’t forget to consider the so-called “Christmas Star” (which is not actually a star) on December 21st. Then Jupiter and Saturn come closer together in our sky than they have in centuries. This conjunction will make them look like a double planet at dusk.
