I got up at 4 AM, had my coffee and a sandwich and started the long, slow drive to Pinery Canyon, on the west side of the Chiricahua Mountains. A Crescent-chested Warbler had been seen and photographed yesterday, so I thought I better go look for it. I’ve seen this species before, also in the Chiricahua Mountains so I wasn’t too disappointed not to find it today. I had a great morning! Here’s my eBird checklist. I added seven species to my year list, now at 232 species.
My best bird of the day, a Mexican Spotted Owl. It has been many years since I’ve seen one. It won’t show up on my eBird list because it is considered a sensitive species. A pretty bad photo of a Hermit Warbler, but I was glad to see it!I finally caught up to some Red-faced Warblers too. Photography was not very good for most birds, this is the best I could get. Buff-breasted Flycatcher. Another species I haven’t seen for a long time. Here’s the astro project I’ve been working on. Abell 35 was thought to be an ancient planetary nebula, located about 500 light years away in the constellation Hydra. It was eventually determined that Abell 35 was formed from a binary pair of stars and that the wind from those stars formed the bow-shock feature that can be seen in this image. Abell 35 is moving through space at 10 times the speed of sound giving rise to a shock wave that created the nebula.
There were several things working against me, it is very faint, it stays low on the horizon, and it is small. The C8 would have worked better for size, but at f6.3 and with no duoband filter for that scope, it would haven take many more hours of exposure and even then I don’t think it would be very good. As it was, with the 500 f4 and the IDAS Nebula Booster filter, I have more then 6 hours on this. I think it turned out quite well. The night of May 9, I noticed a glow in a place where there should be no glow. In between Arcturus and Spica, I could see it with the unaided eye. I set up a tripod and camera (I wish I had taken the time to set up the tracker too but didn’t) and got this. I posted it on Spaceweather.com and it wasn’t long before other folks were posting it too. It turns out it was probably a satellite fuel dump, illuminated by the sun. If so, this was at very high altitude. Others who saw it reported from San Pedro de Atacama, Chile, Missouri, and New York state. The sighting from Chile is pretty incredible, it must have been at a very high altitude.
One reply on “Pinery Canyon, Abell 35 and ?”
What a great list of birds! That owl! What a cool space observation! You are clearly having a blast!
One reply on “Pinery Canyon, Abell 35 and ?”
What a great list of birds! That owl! What a cool space observation! You are clearly having a blast!