Tweedledee Posted April 7, 2016 Share Posted April 7, 2016 I'm having a few nights away at Wychnor Park Country Club near Lichfield. It is about as dark as Belper here and I spent a lovely couple of hours with the binoculars from about 9.45pm. Had a walk through a wood to put the trees between me and the lights of the Wychnor complex and found a great observing spot. Lots of drifting cloud, probably 50% cloud cover on average, but always lots to see in the gaps and superb transparancy tonight. I have my 2.1x42 Vixen goggles and 15x70 Celestrons. the Vixens are great for viewing whole constellations in one view. Lovely to see all the stars of Cancer looking something like an actual crab with both the Beehive M44 and M67 nicely visible at the same time. So many stars and little clumps of stars to see in Monoceros. M36, 37 and 38 all visible in the same view as the Flying Minnow asterism in Auriga. Just panning slightly left and M35 with Collinder 89 also enter the view. The 30 plus degree field of the Vixens nicely frame the Coma cluster Melotte 111 like no other optics can, making it look like the Beehive in Cancer does in the 15x70s. The Vixens allow you to easily identify all the fainter constellations like Lynx and Leo Minor plus all the fainter members not normally visible in other constellations we know so well. The 15x70s showed M81, 82 and M51 easily as little fuzzies with their distinguishing shapes, but their altitude gave me a crick in the neck. With just a 4 degree field they only showed parts of the Coma cluster allowing panning around to take in the whole marvellous sight of this bright cluster. In Leo Minor the Sailboat asterism Harrington 6 looked nice, and putting it to the bottom of the field brought the pretty trapezium of the 30 Leo Minor grouping into the view with stars of magnitude 5 to 7. The jewel of this group is UU LMi which is a nice binocular double with both stars of about 7th mag. The Beehive M44 was absolutely stunning and although a lot smaller, M67 stood out well in the Celestrons. Although quite a small cluster in the bins, the faint stars of M67 form an intricate shape noticeably surrounded by an interesting group of brighter stars. One third of the way from Pollux to M44, along the same line of sight, is a beautiful string of a dozen 6th to 9th mag stars over 2 degrees long. This is just like a smaller version of Kembles Cascade and is such a pretty find that I stumbled across accidentally over a year ago. The above are the highlights, but I enjoyed lots more scanning around and had a really great session without getting too cold. M. and Smithysteve 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+RonC Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 (edited) Good report, any sighting of the aurora last night? I saw it here for the first time about 9pm! Cheers Ron Edited April 8, 2016 by Ron Clarke Tweedledee 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smithysteve Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 An interesting report Pete, you obviously had a good session, with good skies and a contrasting choice of bins. The vixens are on my wish list... I almost bought some at the IAS show last year... i was dithering at the time and ended up with a couple of ep's, but soon...! cheers! Tweedledee 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 Fantastic read Pete you certainly know your way round the skies. And congratz Ron on your first sighting of the aurora, I'm still to see it. Tweedledee 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BAZ Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 You always turn out something different in your reports Pete, it's brilliant. It means I have to go and have a look at what you have been seeing. Enjoy your stay. Tweedledee 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tweedledee Posted April 8, 2016 Author Share Posted April 8, 2016 12 hours ago, Ron Clarke said: Good report, any sighting of the aurora last night? I saw it here for the first time about 9pm! Cheers Ron Thanks Ron, it would have been lovely to see some aurora. I think the sky was dark enough, but my observing site had trees obscuring most of the northern sky up to about 40 degrees. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tweedledee Posted April 8, 2016 Author Share Posted April 8, 2016 Thanks Steve, Mick and Martyn. Still lots of areas of sky I want to know better and new stuff to see, so I keep on looking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 I like a good bin browsing session. I've never heard of UU LMi before. I'm glad you mentioned M44, a personal favourite. You found some great targets. On a rare clear night, I can pot M65 and M66 but if I can't see M81, M82 and M51, I don't bother. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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