What am I seeing?

[Daz1974]

Evening all,

Still not yet bought a telescope, but do have a set of 10x50's which I am using for the first time.

From my back garden I can see Jupiter clearly, and thru the bins there is a feint dot at approx. 2 o'clock. Is this europa or ganymede or a bit of dust on my binoculars? According to stellarium it could be one of these but didnt expect to be able to see them through binoculars.

Also, Im looking at cassiopeia and if im straight at it, approximately at 7 o'clock there is something twinkling like mad. Through the bins it appears to show greens/reds (or is that just my eyes) is this likely to be capella?

Im basing my guesses purely on google sky maps on my tablet and stellarium for the time being

thanks for your help

[John]

Jupiters 4 brightest moons are quite visible with 10x50 binoculars, except when they are close to the planets disk. Stellarium should show you which moon is which.

[Daz1974]

Thanks John.

As the night went on and I got more used to viewing I could defintely make out 2 of the 4 moons last night. Not bad for a pair of £20 binoculars.

[ronin]

Depending on where the moons are you should be able to see all 4 if they are suitably out to either side. I have with normal birdiing bin's - 8x42.

Bit puzzled by one being at 2 O'clock, when I looked 3 nights back they were in a more or less horizontal line.

[Daz1974]

can currently see 3 of the 4 moons tonight. putting the binoculars on a tripod makes a bit of difference!!

being outside tonight is making me hungry. There's a bread factory about a mile away and they're baking at the moment and there is a lovely smell of freshly baked bread.