Who should be observing?

Kevin Ritschel

Well, it was wonderful out here in Willow Springs last night. During twilight, the sky was filled with Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn and the Big-Fella, Jupiter.

When it finally got really dark (had a SQM reading of 21.71), I explored the M7 region. With binocs and scopes up to 12" (the night was too short to drag out a bigger dob), I found NGC's 6455, 6437, 6421 & 6415 - all big star clouds, but given NGC numbers. Also logged B283, B286 and B287 - all dark nebula. B286 has a complex crab-like shape in the 12", but is even visible in 10X40 binocs. Of course there are two globulars down there (one just about touching M7) and an emission nebula NGC 6357 a few degrees west.

All of these objects are within the 10x binocular's field-of-view of M7. If you have a good southern sky, I recommend spending some time down down near the scorpion's stinger.

Kevin