Who should be observing?

Kevin Ritschel

Saturday night, 8-23-08, was wonderful as well here in Willow Springs, and I had another peaceful night on the patio with some scopes. I observed till the moon was up and hit the sack about 12:30.

Unless noted, I observed the following with the 4" Vixen APO (since this is my newest "tube", I have been using it often to see what you can see with it - the answer is a LOT of wide field stuff using 2" oculars) - also a lot easier to grab-n-go than one of my big dobs:

* M6 and the two dark clouds East & West of M6, easily in the same field of a 56mm, 2" plossl - these are B275 & B278. (Uranometria, Chart 164 = U164)

* The open cluster NGC 6425 NE of M6, U164

* The open cluster NGC 6416, U164, this is resolved and quite large, almost the same size as M6 - like a very unequal, southern hemisphere version, of the Double Cluster.

* NGC 6400, an open that does not resolve with the 56mm, U164. This is easily found, just follow the direction of Scoprio's two stars in the stinger, about half way to the Globular 6441 next to G Scorpio.

* Ha 16 - an open that forms an almost equilateral triangle with the two stars of the stinger, U164. Just NW of the two stinger stars.

* NGC 6334, an emission patch that is vary faint, even with an OIII, but was half the field of the 4" with the 56mm plossl - NW of the stinger stars, U164

* Sh2-54 - a faint emission patch N of M16, U126 - very big

* NGC 6589, 6590 - two little emission patches that were easy in the 12", unfiltered, with a 32mm ocular, but I couldn't see them in the 4" at low power, until I "found them" in the 12", U145

* Sh2-35 - very faint emission nebulae near 6589/6590, U145. These last three objects are just SE of the star cloud, M24.

* IC1283/84, just NE of 6589/6590, two more emission patches that need averted vision to see even with the OIII filter, U145.

* Then a bunch of "eye-candy" NGC 281, The Helix, M31. The combination of the 4" refractor and 2" 56mm perfectly frames the North American Nebula and with a UHC or an OIII the nebula is "there," you don't need averted vision or any imagination to see the classic, often photographed shape.

Kevin