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Astrophotography Herps

Back at Granite Gap

I left Ajo last week and drove to Granite Gap, just across the border in New Mexico. I planned to stay here awhile and do some astro and that has been working out OK. Otherwise, I think it is drier here than the Ajo area. There is not much vegetation that is green. There is a herd of cattle on this BLM land and I’ve been watching them eat prickly pear cactus. There is no grass for them to eat.

I’ve been adding more time to NGC 4725. I’ve lost track of the hours of exposure, but it must be around 6 or 7 by now. I think it is worth it. As always, right click on an image and open in a new tab or window for a larger image.
The larger, eliptical galaxy is M60. Eliptics by themselves are not very interesting but something else happened here. The small galaxy is NGC 4647 and what appears to be a star from our galaxy in the lower right portion is not. It is a Type 1a supernova in NGC 4647. I don’t have a before/after photo but a look at Stellarium confirms this. I read about this on Spaceweather.com and decided to try for it. Both galaxies are about 60 million light years distant in the Virgo galaxy cluster. Type 1a supernova involve a white dwarf in a binary star setting.
NGC 4753, also known as the Dust Devil Galaxy, is a lenticular galaxy in Virgo. It is known for the dust lanes that surround the nucleus. I wanted to see if I could capture those dust lanes. This is a very small galaxy and long way out there; the C8 continues to amaze me with its capabilities. The Losmandy G11 mount and the LaCerta MGen III autoguider gets a lot of credit too.
I’ve added more time to M104 too. The inner dust lanes are starting to show up.
Before I left Ajo, I went on one more night walk up Child’s Mountain Road. There, I found my 3rd Rosy Boa. It is quite fascinating to think about all the years I looked for this species and never found any and now, since last fall, I’m up to three.
There was also a Sonoran Lyre Snake. This is the only location I’ve found this species.

2 replies on “Back at Granite Gap”

The supernova in galaxy NGC 4647 just became visible this month? That’s pretty awesome.

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