This image captures reflection nebulae, dark nebulae, HH objects and a star cluster in the southern constellation of Corona Australis (The Southern Crown) at a declination of -37 degrees.  The complex is located about 400 light-years away from earth.

The series of objects is nicknamed the Anteater Nebula, one of the more appropriate DSO nicknames.  The dust cloud is shaped like an anteater with a huge snout lumbering to the right across the sky.

The dark nebula is Bernes 157, is one of the dustiest, darkest nebulae in the sky. The dust clouds block many of the more distant background stars in the Milky Way. 

Straddling the dark nebula are two wonderful, detailed blue reflection nebulae.  The top blue nebula actually consists of two objects, NGC 6726 and 6727, separated by 1 arc-minute. The nebulae are powered by 2 young stars shrouded in gas and dust, likely having protoplanetary disks.  The bottom blue nebula is the equally interesting object IC 4812, illuminated by a double star of magnitudes 6.4 and 6.7. These two stars have a separation of just over 10 arc-seconds.

A number of smaller white reflection nebulae are seen in the vicinity.  The largest of these is NGC 6729. Like Hubble's Variable Nebula, this object consists of dark clouds obscuring the light of a bright star, in this case the star R Coronae Australis. This variable star can change in brightness almost 4 magnitudes due to the moving cloud shadows, with observable changes in as short of a time as 24 hours. 

The small pinkish comet-like structure of a Herbig-Haro object (HH100) is seen just to the right of NGC 6729. Many other HH objects have been identified in this immediate area through infrared and other means, but they are not visible in this image.

Finally, the spectacular globular cluster NGC 6723 is seen at the upper right. This cluster has a magnitude of 6.4 and a diameter of 10 arc-minutes. It is much further away than the nebula complex, at a distance of 30,000 light years.