Y Canum Venaticorum is a giant carbon star and one of the reddest in the sky. Located around 1000 lightyears away, it is a variable star within a range of 4.8 to 6.3 magnitude.
Several times the mass of the Sun, with a surface temperature of only 2,760K it is one of the coolest stars known. Its redness is due to large amounts of carbon being dredged up from the core.
It was named by the Italian astronomer Angelo Secchi, as ‘the magnificent’.
This RGB image is the result of 15 minutes of RGB data capture from Horsham, as 10-second exposures, in March 2025. A ZWO ASI2600 MM Pro camera was used, through an 8-inch Teleskop-Service Ritchey-Chretien reflector. The frame is approx 33x50 arcminutes in size.
Date: 28/03/2025
Location: Horsham, West Sussex
Photographer: Graham Wilcock
