Characteristics
Lying directly south of Gemini's bright stars Castor and Pollux, Canis Minor is a small constellation in the northern hemisphere's winter sky, bordered by Monoceros (which lies between it and Canis Major) to the south, Gemini to the north, Cancer to the northeast, and Hydra to the east. The three-letter abbreviation for the constellation, as adopted by the International Astronomical Union in 1922, is 'CMi'. The official constellation boundaries, as set by Eugène Delporte in 1930, are defined by a polygon of 14 segments. In the equatorial coordinate system, the right ascension coordinates of these borders lie between 07h 06.4m and 08h 11.4m, while the declination coordinates are between 13.22° and −0.36°. Covering 183 square degrees, it ranks 71st of the 88 constellations in size. Canis Minor culminates each year at 9 p.m. on 16 April.
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