The Daytime April Piscids meteor shower
Key facts
- Peak
- around 22 April
- Active
- about 20–26 April
- Rate at peak (ZHR)
- detected by radio; not visible by eye
- Speed
- about 31 km/s
- Radiant
- Pisces (close to the Sun in the sky)
- Parent body
- Unknown
Dates shift slightly from year to year. This year's peak is in the events calendar, and the meteor-shower planner shows how high the radiant climbs from where you live, night by night.
The Daytime April Piscids are a short daytime shower that peaks on the same date as the Lyrids. While northern observers watch Lyrids at night, radio receivers can pick up Piscids by day.
A daytime shower. The radiant in Pisces lies close to the Sun in late April, so it is above the horizon mainly in daylight. Meteors from it still enter the atmosphere, but the bright sky hides them. Radio and radar detect the ionised trails meteors leave about 80 to 110 kilometres up, and that is how this shower is known.
What we know. Radio observers list a maximum around 22 April, with activity lasting only a few days. The meteoroids enter at medium speed, about 31 kilometres per second, on orbits that pass close to the Sun. Few studies have looked at the shower in detail, and its strength from year to year is uncertain.
The parent. No parent body has been identified.
Spring daytime showers. From late April to June, Earth passes through a series of daytime streams, including the Omega Cetids, Epsilon Arietids, May Arietids and Omicron Cetids, before the strong Arietids and Zeta Perseids of early June. Together they make late spring a busy season for radio observers. Some of these streams may be linked to each other through common parents, but the links are not well established.
What to expect. Nothing by eye; perhaps an occasional earthgrazer, a meteor skimming the atmosphere almost horizontally, low in the east just before dawn. By radio, a small rise in echoes around 22 April.
How to observe. A radio set-up that counts meteor echoes automatically through the day and night will show daytime showers as rises in the counts at times when the radiant is high. Comparing several days around the peak helps to separate the shower from the background.
Viewing tips
- Use a radio receiver to catch this shower by day.
- Run your radio counts alongside a night-time Lyrid watch.
- Look for a rise in echoes around the middle of the day near 22 April.
- Never look towards the Sun when searching for earthgrazers at dawn.
- Keep a long record so the shower can be seen against the background.