Particulars:
General:
A quite interesting constellation of the southern hemisphere. Lepus, the Hare, is just south of Orion.
Stars and other objects
R Lep is a long-period variable of a deep red colour
(spectraltype C6IIe; brightness 7.71 mag average). It is also
known es Hind's Crimson Star. The brightness
varies from 6th mag to 10|th mag about every 430 days.
The double star gamma Lep is a duo of a yellow and a red
star with 4th mag and 6th mag, respectively. Its an attractive
pair for binoculars.
Herschel 3752 is a nice triple star visible in small
telescopes.
The open star cluster NGC 2017 is a bit small for the name
star cluster. Binoculars and small telescopes reveal five stars
building a multiple star system. The brightness of the stars
range from 6th mag to 10th mag. Two of the stars are close
binaries, but to split the components a telscope with an aperture
of at least 150 mm is needed. So the total number of stars of
this group is seven.
The globular cluster M79 is quite compact and a good
object for small telescopes. It lies close to Herschel 3752.
Detailed information about this cluster can be found in the
Messier database (see link).