Coyote Lake, 17 June 2006

by Bob Jardine

It was clear and mild. Typical darkness, and pretty decent seeing. SQM read about 20.3 at 10PM, 20.4 at 11PM, and 20.5 at about midnight. I got a count of 17 stars in Bootes/CrA at 11:15 PM, corresponding to mag 5.9.

We all took a look at Saturn/Mars and Mercury shortly after sunset. About 10:00 PM, we got busy observing.

I worked on H-2 objects in Coma and CVn until they got too low in the Western light domes. I also stopped off, of course, at the nearby eye candy, like M100, M88, and a couple of others.

I wrapped up with Jupiter, and just by chance took a look at it around 11:50, when one moon was just about to touch the edge of Jupiter?s disk, starting a transit at 11:54 by my watch.

I packed up around 1:30 or so, as did most others. A very nice night.

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Observations with 12.5? f/5 Portaball.

N4312 -- gal, Com -- Just a bit South of M100. Elongated about 2:1 or 3:1 approx. N/S. Averted vision helps. Not brighter center. A pair of stars just following the center. 176X.

N4379 -- gal, Com -- Just a little SE of M100. Pretty small, pretty bright, round. Brighter center. 176X.

N4340, 4350 --gals, Com -- two galaxies in same FOV (9mm Nagler, 176X). Both pretty small, pretty bright. The Western one (4340) is small, pretty bright, roundish, with much brighter center. The Eastern one (4350) is elongated about 3:1, roughly N/S; much brighter center. Very pretty. 4350 is a bit brighter (or at least higher SB) than 4340.

N 5444, 5445 -- gals, CVn -- two galaxies in same FOV (9mm Nagler, 176X). The Northern one (5444, I think) is a little brighter; elong about 2:1, E/W; brighter center. The Southern one (5445) is a little dimmer, elongated also about 2:1, closer to N/S; slightly brighter center.

N 5440 -- gal, CVn -- about one EP field South of 5444/5. Small, pretty dim. Elongated about 1.5:1 SW-NE. A little bit brighter center. A star close by to the SW.

Jupiter -- pretty nice detail seen; one moon transit ingress about 11:54.

Struve 1871 -- dbl, Boo -- pretty clean split with 9mm (176X) and 7mm (226X). Almost equal magnitudes, both white to pale yellow. I got the PA about 330. Peter McK got about 315. Supposedly 1.4 arcsec or 1.8 arcsec, depending on who you believe.