Uncle Rod's Astro Blog

What? No Messier Project this time?! Well, muchachos, who wants “the same” every month? Month after month? I thought we’d take a semi-break for this installment and talk about a book that’s not only one of my favorites, but one I don’t believe I’ve mentioned in all the years the little old blog from Chaos Manor South has been on the air. As you might have gleaned from the title, that book is Turn Left at Orion.

Before we get started, though, my thanks to all who have enquired about Miss Dorothy. She is much improved, back home after a month in the hospital and in rehab, and is getting around with a walker. She can do many things herself now, safely. She’s even been out for lunch to the famous Heroes Sports Bar and Grill with her friends. Dorothy still has a road ahead of her, but her improvement allowed me to think about the AstroBlog and even offer up a short(er) one this month.

Anyhoo, Brother Guy Consolmagno’s (SJ) and Don Davis’ Turn Left at Orion, first published in 1989, has sold over 100,000 copies since it appeared, quite an accomplishment for an amateur astronomy book (let me tell you). However, I don’t hear it talked about quite as much as I used to. Maybe that’s because when it first came out, novice amateur astronomers began their travels across the sky the same way we always had, by star-hopping. Now, of course, many begin with computerized goto. Finding your way to targets is, as you might have guessed, a major part of Turn Left.

I’m not saying one way of navigating the sky is better than the other. If you like to star hop, star hop. It was—for me—a matter of pride to learn the sky in detail. However, if you’re more interested in seeing than hunting, I can’t fault you for that. By all means go goto, I did a long time ago. Many professional astronomers, I note, do not have more than a casual knowledge of the layout of the heavens. Luckily, finding things is not all there is to Turn Left at Orion.

Finally, introduction-wise, why did it take me so long to get around to talking about Turn Left? I didn’t have a copy for the longest time. In fact, I believe the book went missing when I moved into (old) Chaos Manor South all those long years ago. I meant to replace it, but never got around to it. Occasionally, I’d think, “You know, that star hopping book was mucho fun. Wish I still had it. I should buy another copy.” But I didn’t. Until last year. A used copy was being sold by a nice feller at last year’s Deep South Star Gaze for the princely sum of five bucks. You can bet I snapped it up.

What is the book about? What’s it good for? Guy sums it up elegantly in the introduction. After relating how much trouble he had with star atlases and other astronomy books, and how he didn’t begin enjoying the stars until his friend Don helped him find some good objects, he concludes, “[I]t occurred to me that all the books in the world weren’t as good as having a friend next to you to point out what to look for and how to find it.” That’s what Turn Left at Orion is, that friend at your elbow guiding you to wonders.

Following the introduction and some preparatory material on directions in the sky and other basics, as well as some valuable words (and sketches) concerning what deep sky objects will actually look like in a small telescope, we come to the meat of the book: A journey across the sky to hundreds of beautiful objects arranged in seasonal order. The book is in no way revolutionary or even innovative in its instructions for star hopping. It doesn't need or want to be. Turn Left just explains the process simply and clearly—like some kind person did for you early in your astronomy career. 

Where would I begin with Turn Left at Orion? Even with spring here, the winter objects still dominate the early evening sky—and early evening is when you can expect old Unk to be in the backyard with a telescope in these latter days. We’ve already been through a selection of winter wonders in the last couple of Messier AstroBlogs, though, so, yeah, let’s turn east to the coming of the galaxies. Why did I say "semi" break from the Messier Project? You cannot visit this area and not look at two special Messier objects.

Go out as soon as it’s dark—damn this DST—look northeast, and what knocks your socks off? The Great Bear and her Dipper dominate that part of the sky in early spring. There are countless faint galaxies scattered across the Bowl and, indeed, sprinkled through the whole constellation, but if you want eye-candy think “M81 and M82.” That’s just what Unk did the night I hauled my 6-inch SkyWatcher Newtonian and the Turn Left into Chaos Manor South’s backyard.

So, off to the Dipper. While the authors say you don’t need to know the constellations to use the book, that’s not really true; you need to at least be able to identify brighter stars, and prominent constellations and asterisms. That said, the book’s instructions for getting to M81 and M82 are time-honored simplicity itself,

Find the four stars that make up the bowl of the Big Dipper. Draw a line running diagonally across the bowl from Phecda (the one at the handle end that’s not part of the handle) to Dubhe, the star at the opposite side of the bowl. Step from Phecda to Dubhe and one step again along that line.

We are given some advice as to what to look for in the finder as we move across this somewhat star-barren area, but I’ve never worried about that. I did what I always have done, jumped from Dubhe the same distance it is from Phecda, and put my eye to the eyepiece.

Suzie's M81

So, what did ol’ Unk see on this so-so evening on the first day of spring? One look in the 20mm Orion Expanse eyepiece (the 6-inch f/5 has a 1.25-inch focuser) showed I was on the correct field, with M82, the famous Cigar Galaxy, almost centered (just luck, y’all). A little slewing around, and I got its companion, M81, Bode’s galaxy, in the field with it.  

We will revisit the two on a Messier Project night, but I was happy with the view. M82 showed a prominent dark lane crossing its disk, and M81 was, well, OK. While my S50 Smartscope, Suzie, easily brings back its glorious spiral shape from my suburban backyard, I have never seen a hint of that from compromised skies—with any telescope. You get an elongated disk with a brighter core. On nights of superior quality, I have occasionally seen subtle mottling, maybe a hint of the arms. Or maybe mostly averted imagination.

The best view I’ve ever had of M82 was from the uber-dark skies of the Prude Ranch during the Texas Star Party. My old 12-inch, Betsy, would show the arms in their glory there, but even then they wouldn’t exactly put your eye out.

What do our authors think of the pair? I commend them for not being too cautious. Some books of this sort are afraid of raising a novice observer’s hopes too high when it comes to deep sky objects in a small telescope. I think Guy and Don give us the “just right” here and elsewhere in the book,

"M81, the more rounded one, is not perfectly round, but rather elongated…it’s slightly brighter in the center. M82, the thin one, is lumpy and irregular in shape. On a really good night larger telescopes (6” to 8” or larger) can show a dark lane of dust.”

I have seen M82’s dust lanes from downtown Possum Swamp with my 4-inch Palomar Junior, but again, I think our authors strike a good balance. Not too sanguine about what you’ll see, but not too cautious, either.

And so it goes for the rest of the book:  Guy and Don take us to an object, tell us how it looks (in a smaller instrument), and tell us something about it (as was known in the late 1980s in my first edition). They don’t just stick to the Messier list or the deep sky, either. Their beat includes the Solar System, and we also visit interesting stars and even some NGC objects. Turn Left at Orion is still in print and readily available. 

In other words, this book is a winner whether you’re a beginner or an experienced observer who just wants to visit some Good Ones, especially with a smaller scope—goto or manual. Yes, the book forms a good list for use with a goto scope. However, I enjoy it most the old-fashioned way since getting there—the trip—is often at least half the fun.

Any criticisms? Turn Left at Orion is devoid of astrophotos. I don’t believe there is a single one. I'm sure that is by design, since the authors don’t want to give a novice the wrong idea about how a deep sky object should look in an eyepiece. There are plenty of eyepiece drawings, and while not masterful or elaborate, they are good enough to show Joe or Jane Newastronomer what they should see.

“Hmm…dew’s really falling now.  Reckon I am going to carry the SkyWatcher back inside. I want to check on Miss D, feed the felines, and maybe even crack open a cold 807 or three.” We didn’t go far tonight, but we did go far enough to bring forth my memories of the 1980s and simple telescopes and a classic of a book I used on nights when the stars were still new and fresh for me.

Next Time: Back on the Messier Road we go. I need to clean up a few Winter objects, but we’ll also get started on spring (if the spring storms let us).

Muchachos, this will be a short one. Those of you who are Facebook friends of mine already know my wife, the dear Miss Dorothy, fell and broke a hip. I am grateful to those of you who asked after her and expressed your concern. After multiple hours of surgery, she is on the mend and has been transferred to a rehabilitation facility. I didn’t have much time to work on the blog, but I did want to keep to the Messier Road…

Taurus

M1, the Crab Nebula

Messier 1, Ol’ Crabby, as I called M1 as a boy, a supernova remnant, was discovered by English astronomer John Bevis in 1731. Like more than a few M-objects, it was subsequently “lost,” only to be rediscovered by Charles Messier in 1758. Where does the "Crab" business come from? In the 1840s, Lord Rosse thought the nebula resembled a crab in his big, Dob-like reflector. Why he did, I do not know. It doesn’t look anything like a crustacean to my eyes, or even in Rosse’s original drawing. As most of you know, the Nebula is the remnant of the “guest star” of 1054 recorded by the Chinese. A famous pulsar hides within its folds.

So, how does it look? If you’re a wet-behind-the-ears 12-year-old observer with a 4-inch Newtonian, it doesn’t look like much from a suburban backyard. This was one of the first deep sky objects little Rod located, and suffice-to-say, he was not impressed. I likely passed over it a bunch of times, since, based on the observatory astrophotos in library books, I thought it would be mucho brighter. What it was was a dim oval of light in the field of my ½-inch Ramsden eyepiece. I was disappointed. M1’s visual magnitude figure, 8.8 made is sound reasonably easy. Alas, it’s 8.0’ across, fairly large, so that light is spread out.

That was novice amateur astronomer moi. How about expert observer John Mallas in The Messier Album? John begins by mentioning he had seen M1 as a dim patch in binoculars and in the 40mm finder of his 4-inch, a Unitron refractor. That’s quite a feat in my opinion, though Mallas was observing from far darker skies than I had as a boy, I suppose. He also says he was able to see some “extremely difficult” details in his Unitron, far more than little old me saw with my Palomar Junior. His drawing shows he was at least making out the basic shape of M1.

As with many nebulae, a light pollution reduction filter is key to seeing more detail. In my 12-inch, Old Betsy, an OIII filter finally allowed me to finally observe the filaments that crisscross M1. While the filter enhances these streamers of gas, it darkens the main body of the nebula. With no filter, in Old Betsy and my current “big” scope, Zelda, a 10-inch, the gas filaments disappear, but the nebula's zed or lightning bolt shape becomes clear. The other night with the 6-inch Dob (who has stubbornly not yet told me her name), we were back to the “dim oval” stage.

Suzie, the 50mm ZWO S50 smartscope, had zero trouble with Old Crabby. 45-minutes of exposure in equatorial mode revealed many of the details of the astrophotos in my 1960s astronomy books. Quite amazing, if you ask me. The color is the only thing that has me scratching my head. I’d expected a little green from OIII emission, but that’s not what Suzie’s dual-band filter delivered. I will not quibble with Suze; she did a terrific job for a wee little girl.

M45

The seven sisters, the Pleiades, were covered in my blog article on the 2025 Deep South Star Gaze here.

Orion

M42 and M43

The Great Nebula in Orion is the deep sky object to end all deep sky objects—in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway. I’ve talked about my first looks at M42 as a kid before, notably here, so there is no reason to further gild that lily. It is terrific in any scope or even in smallish binoculars. If M1 tore me down, M42 built me back up and inspired a lifetime of deep sky observing.

As for the “Orion” (as we kid astronomers called it) backstory, that’s a little puzzling. There is no clear record of it from antiquity. Which is strange, since even from modern light-polluted cities it is visible naked eye as a distinctly fuzzy star in Orion’s sword. Has it changed? Become brighter? No one knows. The first reliable record of it comes from Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc, who had a look at it on a chilly French evening, November 26, 1610. As for specs, it is a mindblower with a visual magnitude of 4.0. Despite its size of 40.0’ x 20.0’, that high magnitude value keeps it bright, and it is easy in any optical instrument—or with none at all. The whole field, which includes the comma-shaped companion nebula, M43, is festooned with dust and gas.

I simply never tire of Messier 42. After 60 years of admiring it, I always find something new. After I got old Betsy and acquired some LPR filters in the early 1990s, I saw more than ever. Notably, intricate detail in M43 and the space between it and the main nebula. Though Old Betsy is long gone, I find the view in the 10-inch nearly equal to what I saw in the 12-inch. And I see more today. My eyes aren’t as good, no, but I can observe M42 on any clear night in a suburban sky far superior to the city one I had to deal with in Bet’s heyday.

John Mallas does a fine job of summing up the glory of M42, “Here is one of the most remarkable areas in the heavens. So many details are visible in even a small telescope that it is difficult to make a realistic drawing.” As is often the case, John’s drawing of the Great Nebula is more of impressionistic than realistic. Over the years, some have criticized his style, but a long time ago I discovered that if you view the drawings in the book under a red light, they look remarkably like what you see in the eyepiece of a small telescope. The Kreimer image wouldn't win any prizes today, but back in the long-ago it was a masterpiece, a revelation.

The very first object I imaged with Suzie two years ago was M42. That was the place to start, a nice bright object while I was learning to use the smartscope. My results firmly clued me in that there damn sure was something to this smartscope business.

M78

The other Messier in Orion is the (seemingly) small reflection nebula M78. It’s yet another M not discovered by the Man himself, but by his eagle-eyed friend Pierre Mechain, who stumbled across a patch of nebulosity in 1780. He told Messier about it, and Chuck immediately added it to his catalog as another comet imposter. It is similar in size and brightness to M1, being at magnitude 8.0 and 8.0’ across, but to me, anyway, it seems easier to see in a small instrument.

M78 is just one small part of an area littered with reflection and emission nebulae. It is merely the brightest member of an interconnected group that includes NGC 2064, NGC 2067, and NGC 2071. All these objects are part of the so-called “Orion B” molecular cloud complex, which is about 1,350 light-years from the third stone from the Sun.

I observed M78 routinely as a boy; the brightest portion of the complex, NGC 2068, is not difficult in a small telescope. In fact, it was the first deep sky object I found by star hopping. I was not overly impressed, though. In a 4-inch from the suburbs, M78 is nothing more than an oval nebula surrounding a pair of stars. When did I begin to see more here? Not till quite a while later when I had darker skies and bigger telescopes. And nebula filters. “Nebula filters?! This is a reflection nebula, not an emission nebula, Unk! A filter won’t help.” Not quite, Skeeter. There is emission nebulosity here, too, and when I glommed onto that fact, I began to see even more in the area.

John Mallas observation of M78 lies somewhere between what I saw as a kid and what I can see of the nebula now. He describes it as comet shaped, which had me scratching my head till I realized he was seeing the faint finger of nebulosity that extends to the east, quite an accomplishment with a 4-inch achromat. 

By the time I got around to turning the S50 on M78, I was aware how powerful the little telescope is, so I shouldn’t have been surprised at what she brought back—but I was. Swathes of gas and dust crowd the frame.

The Bottom Line:

16 Down, 94 to go...

And that is going to be a wrap for this one, muchachos. I am off to visit the lovely Miss Dorothy. I missed posting the January AstroBlog, barely, the first time the blog has missed a month in a long time. I intend to make it up with a “bumper” February article, an extra one, if the sky and events cooperate. Excelsior!

Christmas Eve has once again come to Chaos Manor South. It snuck up on your aged correspondent. Wasn’t it just yesterday that Unk celebrated his summertime birthday with a POTA activation and margaritas at El Giro’s? Enough of that. It is what it is; Christmastime is here! We’ll get to the Yuletide doings ‘round the manse in due course, but first let’s talk about the next bunch of Messiers…

Perseus and Auriga

It wasn’t just Christmas that snuck up on your Old Uncle. I belatedly realized the western reaches of Perseus the Hero are getting awful close to the Meridian by mid-evening, and that’s not a good place for picture-taking.  With no time to waste, Unk set up Miss Suzie, the ZWO smartscope, in the back forty on a clear but damp late fall evening and got to work.

Messier 76

First up of Perseus’ two Ms was the Little Dumbbell Nebula (aka, “Barbell” and “Cork”), NGC 650, a well-known if not oft-observed planetary nebula. Once again, we have an object not discovered by Chuck Messier himself, but by prolific observer Pierre Méchain (in 1780). M76 is a magnitude 10.1 planetary nebula, the corpse of a dead star, that measures 3’07” x 2’18”. And there you have the two things that account for M76’s relative lack of popularity with observers: It is small and sounds as if it will be faint.

I had intended to observe M76 visually with Zelda, the 10-inch Dob, but wimped out. What I shoulda done was haul Miss Zelda outside in late afternoon. Alas, I got distracted by other things, and it was dark before I knew it. I wasn’t about to lug her down even the few steps of the deck in anything but broad daylight, so I settled for little Tanya, my 4.5-inch f/5 rescue-scope Newtonian.

I suppose getting under dark skies with Z for a few nights at the Deep South Star Gaze got me back in the red-dot finder groove, because I had no problem getting the Little Dumbbell in the field of a 10mm Plössl (one of the two the humble eyepieces Celestron included with Miss T.). I wouldn’t say the nebula was bright without a filter, but it was doable. While some will tell you M76 is a tough Messier, it’s not. The nebula’s small size keeps its surface brightness relatively high, and adding a light pollution reduction (LPR) filter makes observing it like shooting fish in the proverbial barrel. I routinely viewed this planetary from the suburbs with my old and long-gone ETX-60 (with a filter).  

OK, so what was M76 like in The Tanya? Unfiltered at 57x with the Celestron Plössl, the nebula was a small rectangle of haze just at the limit of visibility. While dim, it was obvious the second I looked into the eyepiece. It still didn’t put my eye out when I replaced the el-cheapo ocular with a decent 6mm Orion Expanse (95x). I added an OIII filter, and, yeah, better (the OIII is the filter for most planetary nebulae). I even imagined I at least detected the streamers of gas that wrap around the central bar of M76.

I plan to move on from John Mallas and Scotty Houston to other observers as this series progresses but seeing as how I was observing with a 4-inch just like John M. (if one with a far less impressive pedigree than his big Unitron), I thought it would be appropriate to turn to The Messier Album once again.

I wondered how the Little Dumbbell looked in Mallas small-aperture scope… It looked good: “A rewarding object in Mallas’ 4-inch refractor. M76 is a miniature of the Dumbbell and is more closely described by this name than is M27 in Vulpecula when both are seen in a small telescope.” I agree the Little Dumbbell is a fascinating object in a 4-inch, but we differ on the appearance of the nebula. John mentions seeing two distinct lobes. I’ve noted this two-lobed nature in the past, in Tanya, however, the nebula was just a nebulous bar. It’s the same in the Evered Kreimer photo in the book, but Suzie’s shot does hint at the dual lobes.  

Suzie had zero trouble imaging the planetary, but I wasn’t satisfied with our results. While Astrospheric and Scope Nights had predicted clear weather for the entire night, Siri disagreed, intoning, “Clouds at mid-evening!” I thought my favorite AI girl was skipping a few gear teeth, but it turned out she was correct, as she usually is. I had less than 20 minutes on the nebula when a message popped up on the ZWO app: “Image discarded, not enough stars,” Rut-roh, I popped outside and looked up: Clouds, thick clouds, and plenty of ‘em. We got another chance the following night and accumulated 45 minutes of exposure.

Let’s face it, M76 is small for a 50mm f/5 smartscope. Nevertheless, Suze turned in a credible effort. After zooming-in via cropping the image (zooming is more practical using Suzie’s EQ mode, since you don’t have to worry as much about egg-shaped stars as you do in alt-az), the two streamers of gas are prominent, as is the nebula’s green OIII color, and even some tinges of red. Good show, girl!

Messier 34

The other Perseus M, open cluster M34 (NGC 1039), is probably a Giovanni Batista Hodierna find; he appears to have observed it from Sicily in 1654. If he did, nobody outside Sicily heard about it. What is known for sure is Charles Messier—who doesn’t seem to have known about Hodierna’s work—saw it, resolved it, and cataloged it a decade later: “A cluster of small stars, a little below the parallel γ Andromedae; in an ordinary telescope of three feet [focal length] the stars can be distinguished.”  M34 is bright at magnitude 5.8, but also spread-out at a size of 35.0’.

I gave Tanya a shot at M34, but no-go. With Christmas Eve approaching at a breakneck pace, the weathermen said the last chance I'd get to see the Spiral Cluster would be dicey at best. As darkness fell on a warm and humid evening, Tanya was dripping with dew after a mere half-hour outside. I could tell fog was creeping in and got on what I was pretty sure was the correct field post haste. Nada. Knowing I didn't have time to fool around, I dashed inside and retrieved the SkyWatcher 6-inch f/5 Dobsonian.

With a little extra aperture, M34 was visible in a 20mm Expanse (Synta-made) widefield ocular at 37x. Visible, yeah, but not what you'd call "rich." Nevertheless, I declared it a win on a night like this one. The brighter cluster stars were there, but dimmer members and the scads of background suns were absent. That lack of background stars actually made M34 stand out better. "Spiral cluster"? Maybe it's just me, but I scratch my head over that one. What I see is a medium-rich group dominated by star chains.  

John Mallas calls this “A very fine cluster,” but opines that this is an object for smaller apertures due to its large size. That is still somewhat true, but we now have richest field telescopes and widefield and ultra-widefield eyepieces. Today, this one is a standout in larger-than-4-inch scopes, too.

Suze did a fine job on this galactic cluster, but her image highlights the cluster’s “problem” in images and with larger aperture instruments under dark skies: It tends to melt into the rich background starfield.

Onward to Auriga we go. The three famous Auriga open clusters are a sentimental favorite of mine. I could occasionally coax my Old Man, W4SLJ, out of the house for a look through my Palomar Junior on long-lost 1960s nights. While he was mainly interested in seeing the Moon and planets, he did like M42, and, maybe even more, the Charioteer’s clusters. He referred to them as “The Big Three,” and always requested I point my little scope at them on winter nights. How I wish I could have shown SLJ these three wondrous star nests from the dark skies of the Deep South Star Gaze with my 10-inch telescope… Anyhow, we begin with the westernmost group.

Messier 38

Yep, yet another DSO not found by ol’ Chuck. M38 (NGC 1912) was first recorded by Hodierna on a chilly Italian evening around 1654. This cluster was forgotten or overlooked by the astronomers who followed him before being rediscovered by Guillaume LeGentil in 1749. Its specs clue you in that this is one good open cluster: magnitude 6.8 and 20.0’ across. Bright and big, but not too big.

This cluster, my second favorite among the Big Three, was a wonderful sight in Miss Zelda from the dark backwoods of Louisiana. M38 is nicknamed “The Starfish Cluster,” and it is easy to see why. While there are many dim background stars, your eyes are drawn to the chains and patterns formed by the cluster’s brightest suns. They seem to suggest yes, a starfish—or maybe an octopus or cosmic spider. The starfish effect is enhanced by the fact that the more prominent cluster stars are of similar brightness. Best view? In my old 16mm 100° “Happy Hand Grenade” ocular at 78x.

In John Mallas’ beautiful—if small-aperture—Unitron, his impression was “[S]quare-shaped with a clump of stars at each corner.” I can see that, yeah, the central region, the “body” of the starfish or spider, is squarish. I don’t see clumps of stars, though, I see chains. Neither of us is wrong. Looking at galactic clusters is like looking at clouds; you see what those shapes suggest to your mind. Overall, Mallas was impressed, “For small apertures, this is a beautiful cluster in a rich field.” With that, I agree, but the same goes with larger apertures with appropriate eyepieces.

In the ZWO smartscope, M38 looked much as it had to my eye in Louisiana. OK, OK, I’ll admit Suze saw more background field stars from the backyard than I did with a 10-inch from a dark site. There was a bonus, too, one I overlooked with the Dobsonian. At the edge of the frame is another open cluster, little (5.0’) magnitude 8.2 NGC 1907. Not only did I miss it in the eyepiece at Feliciana, I didn’t notice it in Suzie’s shot until the exposure was done. If I had, I’d have reframed the picture to show it better—or at least have turned off the ZWO’s watermark.

Messier 36

M36, NGC 1960, was first seen by Hodierna in 1654. He had no idea what it was, being unable to resolve its stars with his small instrument. It was merely another intriguing “nebulous patch,” which could be anything.  Following Hodierna, it was rediscovered and lost again time or two before being spotted by Messier in 1764 with his 3-foot telescope. Charles was the first observer to resolve the cluster. M36 is both smaller (10.0’) and brighter (magnitude 6.5) than neighboring M38.

This M-object is often called “The Pinwheel Cluster.” I’m not sure that’s what I saw with Zelda on those Louisiana nights, though. Oh, it was beautiful, but my impression was mostly of a rich splash of stars with a medium-dense center. It’s tight but doesn’t begin to look like a loose globular. Maybe 10-inches was too much aperture to give a pinwheel impression, resolving too many dim stars. Anyhoo, I liked it best in the 13mm Ethos (115x).

Mallas, thanks to his smaller aperture, had an easier time seeing an overall shape. However, he doesn’t seem to have seen a pinwheel either, “Outward streamers of faint stars gave a crab-like appearance.” He does note the same thing I did, the lovely color contrast among the cluster’s suns.

Not too much to say about the smartscope’s take on this one. M36 is without doubt the weakest of the three Auriga clusters. It looks good in Suzie’s shot, but pales alongside M37, of course.

Messier 37

The last of the Big Three, M37 (NGC 2099), is another one bagged by Hodierna (in 1654). It was promptly “lost” and rediscovered by Messier in September 1764. In our trio of beauties, M37 is the standout. At magnitude 6.2 and 14.0’ across it is both the brightest and richest of the Auriga clusters.

For Unk, there is no contest; M37 is the best, the richest, the most beautiful. In the 10-inch, it was a mind blower, looking more like a loose globular than a galactic. What I saw was a triangular core about 5.0’ in size surrounded by an outer halo of stars bright and dim, all looking tiny and marvelous. The cluster’s renowned red central star was more than obvious. My most memorable view of M37, however, was with my old C8, Celeste, one dark winter’s eve’ sixteen years ago at the Chiefland Astronomy Village:

This gorgeous open cluster in Auriga was just indescribable in the 13 Ethos. At times it looked almost like the south’s great globular cluster, Omega Centauri. At other times, it assumed weird shape and substance. One time I found myself seeing the central triangular area of the cluster as the head of a raging bull, M37’s red central star forming its baleful eye: the whole thing a miniature Taurus.

John’s opinion of M37 in The Messer Album mirrors my own: “This is one of the finest open clusters in the heavens.” Maybe I’d change that to “the finest.”  This group is often called the “Salt and Pepper Cluster,” but that doesn’t seem adequate. Maybe the old “diamond dust on black velvet” cliché is the best description of this wonder.

There’s nothing to complain about in Suzie’s picture of this great cluster. It’s just beautiful. It’s not a criticism to say it looks less like a loose globular than just a rich galactic cluster; that’s the difference between eyepiece impressions and looking at an image. When you study a photo of M37, it is obvious the group doesn’t come close in richness to even a loose glob like NGC 5053. I am very pleased with little Suzie’s image, though.

Cleanup on Aisle Cassiopeia!

I should have stopped by Messier 103 when I observed M52 at Deep South. Somehow I forgot about it, though, so I made my way over to this spectacular cluster once Zelda and I returned home.

Messier 103

M103, NGC 581, is another one discovered by Messier’s friend and fellow observer, Pierre Méchain, in 1781, and was added to the Messier list by the man himself. What’s special about this young, metal-rich cluster (Magnitude 6.9, 5.0’)? It was the last object added to the Messier catalog by Messier himself.

Yeah, I sure wish I’d turned the 10-inch to M103 during the star party, but I didn’t, so I'd have to see what a small reflector would do with the group from home. When Miss Dorothy and I moved out here a decade ago, my backyard skies were often impressive. Now, they have gone from the “suburban-country transition zone” to the “suburban” category.

I viewed M103 on the same night as M34, and it also got the 6-inch treatment. Despite haze that was rapidly thickening to fog, the cluster was immediately visible when we were on the field. However, the lovely arrowhead of stars that defines it was, well, small, real small. Tanya would have had a hard time here. In a 9mm Expanse (83x), the 6er gave a decent view. The Arrowhead even gave up a few of its dimmer suns. 

John really dug M103. How could he not? “A grand view! The stars form an arrowhead which is also seen in photographs. A 10x40 finder resolved the cluster, but the 4-inch showed the fainter stars, many of them colored.” Indeed, one of the most beautiful aspects of this group is the contrast between the cluster’s blue-white stars and one bright, orange luminary.

Open clusters are duck soup for the S50 smartscope from the suburbs, and Suzie’s image is a nice one. The only way I might improve upon it is to give M103 a longer exposure than the 10 minutes I allotted to it. The picture’s not bad, but there is a little more noise than I’d like.

Christmas Eve 2025 at Chaos Manor South

It is again time for ho-ho-ho and mistletoe and presents to pretty girls...

Thomas Wolfe said, among many other things, “You can’t go home again.” Is that true? Mostly, muchachos, but not always and not completely. If you’re a long-time reader of the Little Old Blog from Possum Swamp, you know our local star party, originally the Deep South Regional Star Gaze, and now the Deep South Star Gaze, was an every-year tradition with me and Miss Dorothy for over two decades. But then much changed. We retired, the pandemic came, and the star party moved to a new location. 

We visited its new venue, a private religious camp, for the 2023 edition, but above and beyond clouds causing a good, old-fashioned skunking on all three nights (which can happen anywhere, anytime), we were not happy with the facility and the food. Most of all, it just didn’t have that “Deep South feel” and Dorothy and I reluctantly decided we wouldn’t be back. 

Then, a few months ago, we got word from DSSG’s longtime director, Barry Simon, that our favorite star party would be moving back to its previous home, The Feliciana Retreat Center (FRC) in Norwood, Louisiana, a place we’d always liked, for the 2025 edition. Dorothy and I didn’t have to do any thinking; we sent in our registration and began looking forward to going home again. 

As the big day approached for us, November 20 (we’d attend Thursday - Sunday of the event), I began ruminating on the equipment I’d haul to the backwoods of Louisiana. Certainly, I’d take Zelda the 10-inch Dob, who is now my big gun, but what else? I’ve yet to get Suzie, my ZWO S50 smartscope under dark skies. And, hey, why not take the Unistellar 4-inch smartscope, too? I could do visual one night and devote the other two to the smarties. But then everything changed. 

Unpacking at the Lodge.

More properly, the weather forecasts changed. Predictions for the week before Thanksgiving, never good, were looking dire less than two weeks out. The closer we got, the less likely it appeared we would see anything at Deep South other than the undersides of clouds. I immediately eliminated the smartscopes from the gear loadout. If the weathermen were correct, there’d be no reason to bring them along. Shortly, I was even considering dropping back from the 10-inch Dob to the 6-inch one. Darnit. 

There was never any thought of us not going, though; even if all we could do was visit with our friends we would be there. Still, what I go to a star party for is deep sky wonders, and I was feeling disappointed. Then, a few days before the DSSG kickoff, the forecasts improved—a little. It appeared we’d get some observing in Thursday, little to none Friday, and maybe a lot Saturday. Whew! 

If I was gonna see anything, I’d need an observing list. That wasn’t difficult to compose. My current obsession, as you know, is (again) the Messiers. I don’t have a good southern horizon at Chaos Manor South, so I would concentrate on the southern “water” constellations, on the Ms in Pisces, Aquarius, Cetus, Capricornus, etc. 

With DSSG week almost here, it was time to round up all the old outdoor gear we’d used at so many star parties. First up, though, was a trip to Academy Sporting Goods for a replacement for the ginormous Plano tacklebox I used as an equipment case for years and years. It's still in perfect shape but is now too heavy and awkward for me. I purchased a (much) smaller one as its replacement. We also picked up a sleeping bag for Miss Dorothy, since hers had gone missing. 

We’d need bags since we weren't sure Feliciana would provide bedding, and it’s easier to bring a sleeping bag than fool with sheets, blankets, etc. Naturally, the Wednesday afternoon before Deep South, when it was time to load the 4Runner, Miss Van Pelt, my bag was also MIA. Luckily, it (and Dorothy’s old sleeping bag) turned up just before Unk headed back to Academy for another one. 

I also found the little black cat heater I used on chilly nights on the field years ago. I put it back away, since the weathermen were unanimous in saying we wouldn’t need it. Highs would be in the 80s and lows in the 60s except for Saturday, which might get into the 50s. The Coleman chairs were accounted for and so was the camp/observing table. While our picnic canopy, our EZ-Up, was looking a little time-worn, I judged it good enough for one more star party. I’d sprayed it with 3M waterproofing in 2023, and we’d never even set it up on the field that year. Now, I just had to get everything into the 4Runner... 

Back on the old field 8 years later!

While I’d be loading a modest amount of gear compared to what I used to lug down to Chiefland in the go-go days of the Herschel Project, I was out of practice getting everything into the truck and fumbled around for quite some time. I forgot the camp table had to go in first and on the bottom and wound up taking everything back out and reloading it all. So it goes; we were ready for Deep South. 

The trip itself was nothing. It’s just under three hours on I-10, I-12, I-55, and a short stretch on Louisiana back roads. It was entirely uneventful save for me not recognizing any of the scenery or landmarks along the way as we neared Norwood. I guess eight years’ absence will do that for you. Thanks to my trusty GPS, we found the FRC entrance without incident and were soon rolling onto the grounds. 

So, out on the field, what was the deal? Partly cloudy. Warm, very warm. A feel of possible bad weather in the air. You know what the whole thing reminded me of? Miss Dorothy’s first star party in 1994. While that was earlier in the year and at the event’s original home, Percy Quin State Park in Mississippi, the feel was eerily the same: Heat and humidity and maybe not much observing. The weather goobers were now warning of possible severe weather Friday, but it looked like the really bad stuff might bypass Norwood. 

Field set up was easy enough, since there wasn’t much to set up. The main task was getting the EZ-Up erected, but with Dorothy’s help, and the help of a fellow ham (I counted at least five radio amateurs in attendance), we got the thing up before your old Uncle was quite drenched in sweat. It is nothing to set up a manual 10-inch Dobsonian (other than me struggling with the weight of Zelda’s steel tube). No computers, no cables, no batteries. With the chairs, table, and ice chest out of the truck, we motored up to the lodge to see what was what. 

My impressions of the FRC lodge nearly a decade down the road? The dining area looked as nice as ever, very nice, that is. Our small motel-type room? I didn’t notice many improvements/changes, but it was obvious the rooms were better maintained than they had been the last several years Deep South was at FRC (which is now billing itself as the “Feleciana Retreat and Conference Center). They had replaced the mattresses with better ones, and bedding was furnished, making our sleeping bags superfluous. All that remained was to hang out on the field with the old friends we’ve observed with for three decades and wait for supper at 4pm. How would that be? 

The answer was “better, much better.” The young couple doing the cooking and serving did a fine job, and Thursday’s BBQ chicken was some of the best star party food I have eaten in a while. One of the things that impelled Deep South to leave Feliciana in the first place was a decline in the quality and quantity of food. I deemed that fixed. Supper done, it was time to get a move on. With the temperature in the 80s, it didn’t feel like late November, but it was, and darkness would come not long after 6pm. 

The way the skies looked Thursday afternoon, I’d feared the night would be a complete washout (maybe literally), but as astronomical twilight came, the clouds scudded off, or at least a giant sucker hole grew until it encompassed the entire sky, giving us a couple of hours of cosmic voyaging. I’m afraid I spent most of that time fumbling and bumbling with the telescope, though. 

Your silly old Uncle was way out of practice using a dob under a dark sky. I had an awful hard time getting used to using the Rigel Quick Finder zero-power finder again. That wasn’t all. It seemed I had forgotten exactly how to work AstroHopper, the iPhone app that guided Zelda to her targets. I eventually got mostly in the groove with all that jazz and knocked a few list objects out. 

Note that on all three evenings I observed quite a few objects in addition to the list Messiers. But this is about the Messier Project and those are the objects Unk is gonna (mostly) tell you about… 

Images were shot with Suzie from Chaos Manor South Shortly after DSSG. 

M2 (Aquarius) 

Did not like the way the sky looked Thursday afternoon...

The second object in Messier’s catalog is one of the finest globular star clusters in the sky. It is somewhat diminished for mid-northern observers by its southerly declination down in Aquarius, but it is still quite a prize. At magnitude 6.5 and 16.0’ across, it begins to resolve in small telescopes, and in 8-inch and larger instruments it is a welter of tiny stars of Magnitude 13.1 and dimmer. With a Shapley-Sawyer Class of II, the core is quite concentrated.  

Despite swimming in and out of the haze that was beginning to cover the southern sky, M2 was well-resolved by Zelda, looking like a sparkling blue sapphire in the 13mm Ethos eyepiece at 96x. I hadn’t seen this glob, a favorite of mine in my old 12-inch telescope, looking this good in a long time. That haze no doubt reduced the cluster’s brightness, but it was still bright and prominent and well-resolved.

M2 is yet another “Messier object” not discovered by Charles Messier. Credit for that goes to. Jean Dominique Maraldi, who was out observing a comet with his buddy, Jaques Cassini, one nice French night in 1746. Charles is credited with the cluster’s rediscovery in 1760. You won’t be surprised to hear his tiny scope didn’t resolve any stars and is listed as a “nebula without stars.” In fact, nobody realized it was a star cluster till William and Caroline Herschel had a look at it some years later.   

Turning once again to my favorite Messier book, The Messier Album, John Mallas is enthusiastic about M2: “A beautiful object.” I can’t compare his observation to mine, since my instrument, Zelda, was so much larger than his 4-inch Unitron. He remarks his scope was only able to resolve “[A] few bright members across the nebulous image.” While Evered Kreimer’s photo wouldn’t be anything to write home about today, it was groundbreaking for the time. 

It's hard to get a bad image of M2!

The ZWO was faced with both light haze and a nearby Moon the week after DSSG, but she did an OK job with this magnificent cluster. 

M72 (Aquarius) 

The other Messier globular in Aquarius, M72, is that horse of a different color (the one you’ve heard tell about), being both considerably dimmer (magnitude 9.2) and smaller (6.6’) than monster M2. Discovered by Pierre Mechain, Messier observed the cluster the following year, 1781. 

Messier 72 is a small, subdued globular cluster and looked it on this evening. That doesn’t mean it was difficult to see, even in worsening conditions; it was obvious as a small fuzzball in the 27mm Panoptic when I put my eye to the eyepiece. The 8mm Ethos delivered a little resolution at 156x, but it was still more “grainy” than “resolved. The core of this Type IX cluster is quite loose but still fairly bright. 

This was not an easy object for John M’s 4-inch achromat. In his scope it was “A very small and nebulous patch of light” He was able to tell detect M72’s loose structure, however. 

It wasn't so much that this was a dimmer object, but that conditions were not right for imaging. Miss S50 and I went after M72 anyway, and at least we got a little "cosmic postcard, " a memory of a night under the stars, for our efforts

Sadly, that was it for list-objects on Thursday evening. The southern area of the sky was out of action by 7pm. I spent the remainder of the night looking at some pretty stuff (the Veil was decent, and M15 was a mindblower at high power) before retiring to the lodge room just before 9 for YouTube videos and sarsaparillas. 

Then came Friday morning. How would breakfast be? Good. Very good and lots of it. The star of the show was the biscuits and sausage gravy. There was more—eggs, grits, sausage--but that was just the supporting cast for Unk. Excellent. 

Suzie's M52.

Sometimes star party days go slowly, but I found things to do on Friday. I sat in the dining hall with the MacBook Air, making notes on my observations, and…installing a new astronomy program. Unk has SkySafari Pro 7 on his iPhone and loves it. However, when I opened the program on the Mac I realized I was still on 6. I was able to download 7 for free and was excited to have the new one on the MacBook. 

Well, until I tried it. Simulation Curriculum, the makers, didn’t do a good job porting it from the iPad to the Apple Silicon Macs. Zooming is broken. Oh, you can zoom, but you have to use buttons. For me, zooming with the mouse/trackpad is erratic at best. Luckily, 6 is still on the Mac and that is what I will use. Maybe they’ll fix 7, but after this long, I doubt it. 

Following a great supper of Thanksgiving ham, dressing, and all the fixings, Friday night started out promising, but clouds began rolling in not long after dark. The southern constellations were soon gone, but the north-northeast was clear for a while, and that’s where me and Zelda went. Starting with a look at a nice open cluster... 

M52 (Cassiopeia) 

Finally a Messier Object discovered by Messier! He spotted this galactic cluster floating along the Cassiopeia Milky Way in 1774. At Magnitude 7.7 this magnitude 6.9, 15.0’ diameter open cluster is trivial for binoculars or very small telescopes. 

M52 was certainly impressive in Zelda… I hadn’t expected too much on this increasingly punk night, but it was outstanding, looking more like a loose globular cluster than a galactic cluster. A bright star on the edge of the cluster’s densest section made it distinctive. 

Mallas didn’t see much here with his Unitron. Other than that single bright star, the 4-inch didn’t resolve M55 or even make it look grainy. I wonder if John observed this one on a poorer night, since it seems to me I’ve had some good looks at it and considerable resolution with 4-inch telescopes. 

Most open clusters aren't a challenge for the ZWO. Suze delivered a nice portrait of this one with only five minutes of exposure. 

I hoped for clearing, but as 9pm came, the sky got worse. I did manage two more deep sky objects, though, the stars of our 1994 Deep South: 

M74 (Pisces) 

Suzie did a nice job on the Phantom given the conditions

Numero uno was the Phantom Galaxy in Pisces, M74, which was first spotted by Pierre Mechain in September of 1780. Messier was able to confirm the observation a few weeks later, which I find impressive. His scope was tiny, and this is the second toughest Messier (after M101). Why? It’s not terrifically dim at magnitude 9.4, but it is large, 10.5’ across, and the light of this face-on Sc galaxy is badly spread-out, giving it a surface brightness of 14.1. It is an object for 10-inch and larger scopes under dark and steady skies. I’ve had the best success with it when the seeing is excellent. 

As I’ve written many a time, the best look I have ever had of M74 was that fall of ’94 at Deep South with Betsy, my old 12-inch Dob (then in her original Meade Sonotube). This night? I’d be hard put to say M74 looked any worse. Conditions on both nights were similar, including both slightly reduced transparency and steady seeing. When AstroHopper told me I was there, the galaxy was immediately obvious in the 27mm Panoptic eyepiece. Best views were in the Happy Hand Grenade (Zhumell/TMB) 16mm 100° (78x) and the 13mm Ethos, both of which delivered mucho spiral structure. My visit to the star party this year was worth it just for this one observation. 

Unsurprisingly, John Mallas found Messier 74 a difficult object indeed for his long focal length Unitron refractor (he notes it was more noticeable in his 40mm finder). Be that as it may, his drawing with the 4-inch indicates he was seeing some spiral structure, quite a feat. Kreimer’s black and white (Tri-X) photo is lovely, and competitive with modern pictures.   

Little Suzie, the SeeStar S50, had to go after the Phantom Galaxy on yet another humid night. While it’s not the best image she’s ever done, she had no problem picking up the spiral arms (and a piece of photobombing space junk). I’m frankly amazed at what she did from my bright backyard. 

M33 (Triangulum) 

It’s difficult to say who originally discovered Messier 33, since it is (barely) a naked eye object at magnitude 5.7—I’ve certainly never seen it without optical aid. What is certain is that Messier spotted it in 1764.  Its large size, 68.7’ x 41.5’ means that despite its bright magnitude, its surface brightness is relatively low, and it’s not that easy to spot the multiple spiral arms of this near face-on SA galaxy. 

The Triangulum Galaxy isn’t a water dweller but was in the clear and was the other star of 1994. It was very good, with its spiral arms amazingly evident—as in “slapped me in the face” evident. I hunted around a bit before I saw the galaxy’s huge emission nebula, NGC 604, but once I oriented myself, there it was. Was it quite as starkly visible as in 1994, when I had two more inches of aperture, a more transparent sky, and younger eyes? No, but it was easy, nevertheless.  One last look and M33 faded out as clouds enveloped the sky. 

John Mallas’ small, slow achromat had a tough time with M33. This is just not an object for narrow field scopes (and eyepieces): “[It] is very faint and difficult in the 4-inch f/15 refractor. Instruments with smaller focal ratios will do much better.” He mentions a bright central region with nebulous patches around it and that is it. 

Suzie? This is a bit on the large side for her (though I could use mosaic mode if I had the patience for that), but it’s not an object that gives her trouble. 

Saturday 

Zelda hoping for Starlight Saturday afternoon...

We had high hopes for Saturday. The usual weather sources on the web (the FRC now has good Internet at the lodge thanks to Starlink) said it might be a good night. Hell, it might even be a long night. Astrospheric pronounced, “OK at sundown but getting better after 8pm local time.” I was skeptical. There wasn’t the feel of a front passage, not a barreling passage like in 1994, anyway. So far, it was more clouds and ever-higher humidity. 

The sky did look pretty good just before astronomical twilight. Then, as I sat out on the field with Len and Annette Philpot, a bank of low, dark clouds drifted in from the south and stayed for a while. They did move off when darkness arrived, but I was nervous that this was a harbinger of things to come… 

Long night? No. In the end, we got maybe 90 minutes of fruitful observing. The Milky Way was visible, but not as bright as it is at this site on a truly good evening, and deep sky objects of all types were passable but subdued. I had the feeling conditions might get worse rather than better after 8pm, contrary to what Astrospheric said, so I didn’t waste any time ticking the remaining water Ms off my list on SkySafari. Since my phone was dedicated to AstroHopper, I had the Mac on the field under the canopy. It was a real help at times. With clouds floating around, out of practice visual observer me sometimes lost his way among partially obscured constellations. SkySafari’s beautiful charts saved me every time. 

The night’s haul? Modest, but not bad for an hour and a half with me giving each object sufficient attention: 

M73 (Aquarius) 

Chuck Messier spotted this asterism in 1780 and thought he saw nebulosity along with four stars. Herschel, however, observed the cluster and found absolutely no trace of the nebulosity Messier thought he’d seen. It was long thought that M73 was a galactic cluster, but spectroscopic studies done a couple of decades ago revealed the four stars are at drastically different distances from Earth. 

This little group of stars isn’t a cluster, but it’s an M anyway. I’d somehow passed it by on the previous two evenings and wanted to get it in the log, lackluster as it is. What you have here is an asterism of four somewhat prominent stars of magnitude 10 – 12 that cover an area of 9.0’. 

All Mr. Mallas has to say about M73’s appearance is, “Messier’s description matches what was seen in the 4-inch. Moderate magnification shows the quartet centered in the photograph.” In other words, “Ho-hum,” which is my reaction as well.

This was obviously nothing for Miss Suze, who showed four stars in a backwards checkmark shape in a short exposure. It doesn't look much different from the shot in The Messier Album.

M30 (Capricornus) 

This Shapley-Sawyer Class V globular cluster was discovered by Messier in the summer of 1764. Like the other globs he observed, it was not known to be a star cluster until William Herschel observed it. At magnitude 6.9, and a size of 12.0’, it’s not difficult for smaller scopes, though they may need dark skies to deliver much resolution. 

M30, which I call “The Goat Cluster,” is one of my favorites, mainly for a curious feature, two streams of stars on the southeastern side of the cluster. More prominent visually than in photos, they suggest the horns of a goat, fitting for a cluster in the Sea Goat. They were visible on this night in the 13mm Ethos but were not as prominent as usual. For one thing, Capricornus was beginning to descend into the west, and for another, the haze was thicker than ever.   

While Mallas’ Unitron didn’t pick up many stars, he still called this “A splendid object even in small apertures.” He also notes the cluster’s “unusual” appearance, which I take to mean the star streams mentioned above. Kreimer’s photo shows the “goat horns” remarkably well. 

Despite conditions, the girl did a nice job on the Goat, her image showing the horns clearly. 

Our final night started out promisingly--but didn't stay that way.

M77 (Cetus) 

Prolific observer Pierre Mechain ran across this magnitude 8.9 SA galaxy in 1780. Of course, he didn’t know anything about galaxies and told His friend Charles he had discovered a nebula down in Cetus. This small (7.1’) object is easy to see thanks to its intensely bright center. M77 is known to be an active Seyfert galaxy and a strong radio source (Cetus A). It is also on Halton Arp’s list of peculiar galaxies. 

Cetus A has never been a challenge in any scope for me. This was one of the few that I could see easily with my 4-inch f/10 Newtonian from the backyard of the old Chaos Manor South downtown. On this evening? Bright. Fascinating. What you see is a large, nebulous envelope surrounding a bright central region with a disk and spiral arms. I bumped up the power to over 200x with the 5.7mm ES eyepiece in hopes of seeing that spiral structure, and I did get a glimpse or two of it on a night that was winding down. 

Mallas was impressed with M77, calling it “One of the best objects for viewing in small apertures.” Not surprisingly, the Unitron didn’t show any spiral features, He does, however, seem to see that the central area of Cetus A is different from that of other galaxies. 

The problem with M77 for the smartscope is that it's a little small, and there is a limit to the central detail you can expect. Nevertheless, Suzie did her best, and I've taken worse picture of this galaxy. 

M75 (Sagittarius) 

It’s not clear whether this one should be credited to Mechain or Messier. It is known that Charles at least confirmed Mechain’s observation in October of 1780. Once again, it was The Man, William Herschel, who first resolved this Magnitude 8.6 cluster. How to describe this glob? Tight, small, relatively bright. It’s a Shapley-Sawyer Type I, the most highly concentrated class. At only 6.8’ across, it is easy to see. 

I got to this one a little late; it was low enough that it wasn’t quite as bright as it should have been in a 10-inch telescope. Which doesn’t mean it wasn’t prominent and easy—it was. However, what I saw was nothing more than a grainy fuzzball with a reasonably bright core. 

His 4-inch presented John Mallas with an M55 that was just a nebulous ball with a bright core. In other words, not much different from what I saw in my 10-inch. I was, however, able to see a grainy texture suggesting resolution, which Mallas didn’t detect in his 4-inch. 

Small, low, on the dim side. Well, at least Suze and I got something. 

And then more clouds came. I waited ‘em out, and they began to thin (some) around 9pm, but only some. Astrospheric had begun talking about “mist,” and it now looked to me as if the clouds hadn’t really left; they had just reduced their altitude. As a check, I sent Zelda to NGC 891, the famous edge-on galaxy in Andromeda. Initially, I thought AstroHopper had missed, but I finally spotted a dim, slightly elongated glow in the field center. I’ve seen this galaxy better with an 8-inch SCT. NGC 7331 was about the same, there, but lackluster. I could see it with fair ease, but the “deer” accompanying the Deer Lick Galaxy, the small galaxies in the field, were invisible. 

Time to throw the big switch? Nope… I wanted to try out my wonderful prize! Your aged Uncle, who rarely wins anything astronomical, had won a TeleVue eyepiece at the Saturday raffle drawing! And a very special (and specialized) TeleVue it was, the 55mm Plössl. This is an eyepiece I’ve thought about buying for years, but I have always hesitated. Mainly thanks to that enormous exit pupil, which is a bit large even for my SCTs. I had one now, though, and I was going to try it out on an f/5 telescope. 

M45 (Taurus) 

Wow! I won something!

Messier placed this galactic cluster in his list, but it had, of course been known since time immemorial—Homer mentions it. The Seven Sisters compose an enormous open cluster—the sisters are only a central region, and they encompass two full degrees of sky. These bright young stars shine with a combined magnitude of 1.5.  In former times the blue nebulosity associated with them was thought to be remnants of the gas that formed cluster the cluster. Then, someone mentioned the color, blue, which is indicative of reflection nebulosity, not hydrogen that forms stars. The Merope Nebula is merely dust with the consistency of cigarette smoke that the cluster is drifting through. 

First object for the 55mm? Why M45, of course. It was quite something to encompass most of the Pleiads in the field of a 10-inch telescope. Exit pupil, exit schmupil; I even convinced myself I saw a trace of the Merope Nebula (uh-huh). 

John has a lot to say about the Pleiades, but mostly background and technical information as it was known well nearly 60 years ago. His big Unitron was, after all, a very narrow instrument for this object. He does tell us of seeing the Merope Nebula with his scope from the dark skies of Arizona, though, which is a master class observation. 

I needed to post this article before I was able to give Suzie a shot at M45, but in the past she’s done a good job on the Daughters of Atlas. 

Saturn 

You can bet I visited Saturn before giving up the ship. With his rings near edge-on, some would say he isn’t quite his normal spectacular self. He is to me. This is the way I saw Saturn with a telescope for the first time, with my Palomar Junior in 1966. On this night, seeing was good; the shadow of the rings across the disk razor sharp in my 4.7mm Explore Scientific 82° ocular (265x). Coolest thing? Little Enceladus was visible just above the plane of the rings and almost seeming to touch them. 

Fun is fun but done is done. The sky didn’t slam shut; it just faded away as it got damper and damper. I covered the faithful Miss Zelda and headed for the Lodge. I was sad not to be able obey the rule my old friend, Pat, and I established many a long year ago, “No going to bed before M42 is up high enough to fool with,” but there was nothing for it. Shining my flashlight into the air produced a cone that looked like the Bat Signal. 

Sunday morning, Dorothy and I departed before breakfast, wanting to get home and check on the cats. It wasn’t pleasant loading sopping wet gear—it seemed more like the product of a downpour than a dew fall—but our simple field setup meant we were on the road in record time. 

The verdict on DSSG 2025? Attendance was 62, nowhere near what it was in the golden age of the 90s - 2000s but improved over the last years at its previous location. I predict the Deep South Star Gaze is on the way back up and has many more good years ahead of it. Our personal experience? Despite the weather, it was just great, and we plan to be back for 2026, I am also hoping to be at the spring edition of the star party, the 2026 Spring Scrimmage, which will also be held at Feliciana again.

Totals:  17 Down 93 to go…

Nota Bene:  You can see many more pictures in the DSSG 25 Photo Album on Unk's Facebook Page...