RA=Best month to view?

[Bumblebee]

I have found some good resources showing objects to view and it lists the RA measurement. Can someone give me a simple explanation on how I can determine which months would be best to view that object by going off the RA?

Thanks!

[AstralTraveller]

Welcome to IIS Florence.

I think there are two approaches. The first is to install one of the free planetarium programs and let it help you. Stellarium is the big name but I prefer kstars; it has some nice tools for planning observations.

https://kstars.kde.org/download/

The second is to use the siderial time to plan the best observing time. The local siderial time is the RA on the meridian (the N-S line passing directly overhead). Our local siderial time is 10h greater than the siderial time at Greenwich (11h during daylight saving), which some sources will quote. So when the local siderial time is the same as the objects RA the object is as high in the sky as it will get. On the other hand, if the local siderial time is, for example, 11hrs and the object's RA is 12h then it is 1h (=15 degrees) east of its highest point.

https://www.omnicalculator.com/everyday-life/sidereal-time