Man, oh man.

So I'm outside just now, in my back yard, and it's pretty clear. 5th magnitude skies, Milky Way above me. I have the new 'scope Tracer gave me set up, and I'm trying to find out how faint it'll go.

I'm straining, trying to get it pointed at the Ring Nebula which is straight up right now. This kind of telescope doesn't like pointing straight up, or, more accurately, it is really hard to move it around easily when it's aimed at the zenith.

I'm bent over awkwardly, looking through the finder, and as I rotate the 'scope I see these two streaks of light circling around in the opposite direction of my own rotation. Having had some experience with this before, I assume they are reflections in my glasses. But they persisted, even when I stopped moving. I took a step back, and realized suddenly that they were birds, chasing each other.

Birds? At night? Then I realized they must be bats. But they were HUGE! They flew overhead, and then were lit by the streetlight across the street, and I realized they were at least two feet in wingspan. Wow. I'll have to find out what kind they were.

And then they started chirping! Weird, tweets and chirps, fast, like a machine gun. I started banging on the door so Mrs. BA would come out. She was amazed as well. They circled around for a while; I could hear them for the next 15 minutes off in the distance.

After that episode, I found the Ring, and drew myself a chart of the stars to see how faint I could see. After a few minutes, I stepped away to see what else was up, and wham! A bright meteor shot across the sky, northeast to south, peaking at about magnitude -1 and leaving a train that lasted for a fraction of a second.

After that, I decided to hit one more object, so I chose Albireo, one of my favorite doubles, because the bright star is golden yellow, and the faint one blue (YMMV).

Sighing contentedly, I put away the 'scope. I was only out about 30 minutes, maybe less, but that was enough for one night.

Wow.

So thanks again, Tracer! Astronomy is a gift that gives more than the stars, it gives a chance to experience beauty even beyond what lies in the eyepiece.

Nice.

My last observing session didn't go as well. Looked for Uranus, but don't think I found it. Then observed a random cluster, which was quite pretty.

Ah, a new scope. I'm limited to binoculars, but I can see with good clarity (usually). Unfortunately my view has been obscured for a while now.

Just across the freeway, Mission Impossible 3 is being filmed at the windmills for some nighttime helecopter chases. All the windmills are lit up taking down the sky. Plus a double whammy of living under the Blaisdale canyon fires had shutdown all viewing for two nights (although both of these kept my binoculars trained on not-to-common occurances :wink: )

The fires (and smoke) are moving out of sight, and the filming must come to an end at some point, so I should be back in viewing action again!

You saw the ring...You know what that means right ? :wink:

I suggest you stay away from television sets, lighthouses, and wells

(edit: Not to metion ME of course!)

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here we go, the world is spinning
when it stops, it's just beginning

sun comes up, we laugh and we cry
sun goes down, and then we all die

Touched by his noodly appendage

As well as a dwarf named Alberich.

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And this old dude whose apparently lost one, Sarumon, Sarumen...?

__________________
here we go, the world is spinning
when it stops, it's just beginning

sun comes up, we laugh and we cry
sun goes down, and then we all die

Touched by his noodly appendage

I "only" have binoculars also...personally, I like having the wider field of view...

Burnham's has them as "topaz" and "sapphire", or "golden and azure". The brighter one is mag. 3, the other mag. 5. We were looking at it on Wednesday.

Damn my city lights and canopy of trees!

I'm really gonna have to find a reason to move out to the middle of no-where.

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Derek Colanduno
host - skepticality
http://www.skepticality.com/

I'm going to have to see if I can acquire binoculars, at least, by ren faire next year. no tree cover and middle of nowhere, and it doesn't rain every year . . . .

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Trees and lights aren't a good enough reason for you? Nah, only kidding, I have the same problem. On a good day I can get some good views of saturn or Jupiter, but forget any nebulae or anything really even sorta maybe faint. I still get good views of the moon though!

One day when I have piles of free time and cash laying around, I might get a cheap used truck and mount my 'scope in the back. To the AstroMobile!

I have another solution - after a while being limited to only being able to see the brightest deep sky objects from my back yard in heavily light polluted Beaveron, I decided to take up astrophotography.

It's a *lot* of work, and the learning curve has been huge so far (about a year and a half in, and I still count myself as a beginner) but the results are most definitely worth it. Even from this location, faint objects that I couldn't even dream of seeing visually are within grasp with a relatively modest setup.

The ring (or, indeed, the dumbbell) are certainly impressive visually. Nothing compares to what they look like in color, though - and it really isn't the same as looking at a HST picture when it's one you took yourself...

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To give a satisfactory decision as to the truth it is necessary to be rather an arbitrator than a party to the dispute.
- Aristotle

I should add that Mrs. Bad Astronomer and I no longer think those were bats, but I am not sure what they were. They might have been brown bats, but with a two-foot wingspan? They might have been owls, but the noise they made... weird.

BTW, check my blog this week: if it remains clear, I'll be taking pictures of Venus and Jupiter every night as they get closr. Should be cool.

I love Astronomy too. That's what brought me here. Unfortunately the St. Louis skies are too humid and full of light pollution to see much with my 6in Dob. Thankfully I now have access to the 14in Cassegrain at the University.

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"I will do my best to understand and explain the universe from big to small without invoking miracles, unrepeatable events, or divine intervention. In place of those things I will use observations, mathematics, and science."


-Cross
My travel blog

Some of my Astrophotography


Those that lack education have a hard time understanding its value. - Cross

hmm. I'm not exactly much of an ornithologist, so I don't think I can help on the flying creature recognition thing. From the noise description, they sure sound like bats... but who knows.

By the way, second the sentiment on Albireo. It really is quite stunning.

I'll watch your blog for pictures - I'll look forward to it!

Regards
Krill

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To give a satisfactory decision as to the truth it is necessary to be rather an arbitrator than a party to the dispute.
- Aristotle

That sounds like nighthawks. The article says these birds aren't usually active after dusk, but I'm fairly sure I've seen them several hours after sunset. I don't have time to read the whole article, but it might help with identification - or provide new clues.

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"I am Meteora, supreme goddess of weather" - Meteora, in The Unchained Goddess

One nice thing about being a meteorologist who also likes astronomy is that the sky is always interesting!

BTW, today's (8/30) APOD is Albireo; in my light polluted skies, best view I'll ever see of them.

Some people have all the luck.

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Freedom For Fission A breath of fresh Iodine-131

Sky's bad here at uni.
But then, I had my first ever real astronomy class today! Granted, it was boring because we're just doing the basic "these are Kepler's laws" things but I have high hopes for this class.

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Greetings.

Some time ago I posted my lamentation concerning my lack of impetus or desire to continue my avocation of astronomy. While I still find some cobwebs in my desire to observe, I recently got a kick in the seat of the pants that seems to have re-ignited my starry desire.

I took my soon-to-be 9 year old son outside shortly after sunset and showed him the Summer Triange as it appeared in the dimming sky. Then the Big Dipper, Cygnus, the Little Dipper, and Aurora Borealis all appeared, friends all to me! My son was rapt and was overjoyed to experience these, and was also rewarded with 2 satellelites AND a meteor, to boot!

And I haven't take out either of my 2 telescopes!! Yet!!

Stars, here I come!!!!

Regards (very happily!), tbm