Whether you like your mythology impish or scary, the constellation Hydra has a story for you. It represents a serpent – a water snake or a dragon. It either got involved with a sneaky crow, or had to be destroyed by the strongman.

In one version, Hydra was a multi-headed monster that lived in a lake or a swamp. It roamed the countryside, eating livestock and causing other problems. It was so nasty that even its breath or a whiff of its blood could kill.

Heracles came to destroy the monster as one of his 12 labors. Every time he cut off one of its heads, though, two more grew in its place. Finally, his nephew brought a torch and seared each head as it was chopped off. That allowed Heracles – the Greek version of Hercules – to carry the day.

In the other version, the god Apollo sent a crow to fetch a cup of water. The crow detoured to gorge on figs. When he finally returned to Apollo, he blamed his tardiness on a water snake. Apollo wasn’t fooled, though. He hurled the crow into the sky, along with the snake and the water cup. He put the snake between the other two to prevent the lying crow from getting a cool drink of water.

Hydra is the largest and longest constellation. Its head is in the east in early evening, but its tail doesn’t clear the horizon until hours later. Only one of its stars is easily visible. You need dark skies to see any of the others.

We’ll talk about a dying star in Hydra tomorrow.

Script by Damond Benningfield