It has been almost two weeks since I’ve updated. Not a lot is happening. It has been typical Sonoran Desert winter weather, except for a lack of rain. There is a promise of some rain in the next few days. I hope it materializes. I drove north to Gillespie Dam on the Gila River to look for a Reddish Egret that keeps popping up. As it turned out, it popped up an hour before I got there and then disappeared again. I may try again, I haven’t seen a Reddish Egret since my trip to south Texas in 2010.
At Gillespie Dam I did get some good shots of a Virginia Rail. I was hoping for a Least Bittern too, but did not see one. A Common Gallinule, also at Gillespie Dam. This species never shows up at Lake Ajo because there are no cattails. The numbers of wintering Sage Thrashers is higher than usual, same for Sagebrush Sparrows, which seem to be very common in the right habitat. Last winter both species were hard to find.The south end of a north bound Javelina. I saw it getting a drink from a tank out by Burro Pass. In town, Javelina are quite tolerant of people but out in the desert, they are very wild and wary. This is LDN 1622, a dark nebula in the Orion constellation. I framed it like this to show the long streamer of cosmic dust below it. The red glow of ionizing hydrogen is a part of Barnard’s Loop. The obscuring dust of LDN 1622 is thought to lie at a distance of 1,500 light-years. At that distance, this nearly two degree wide field of view would span about 60 light-years.I want to add more exposure to this, but it has been too cloudy or windy and looks like it will be a few more days before I can do anything. So here it is, for now. This is IC 2169, also known as Dreyer’s Nebula, in the constellation Monoceros. It is named after John Louis Emil Dreyer (1852 – 1926), the Danish astronomer who compiled the NGC and IC catalogues. This image also includes some smaller reflection nebulas and dark nebulas. It reminds me of M78. I think it will be worth putting more hours into a final image. A Western Bluebird at Highway Tank this morning. Here’s a Rock Wren that was foraging around the camper a few days ago.
The cold has finally arrived, such as it is. Night time temperatures have been dropping to near freezing and will drop below freezing for the next few nights. Time to get out my winter sleeping bag! It still warms up nicely for the day. Some rain would be very welcome. Yesterday, a biologist from the Arizona Game and Fish came out and we found another dead Sonoran Toad at Highway Tank. He took some samples so maybe there will be answers soon as to what is killing the toads.
My annual Kit Fox photo. There are two of them that come around every night now. I found three Long-eared Owls in an arroyo off the Child’s Mountain Road. Not a great photo but I was happy to get it for eBird. Anna’s Hummingbird nectaring on some of the few Ocotillo flowers that are available. A House Wren, first one I’ve seen this winter. Not a common wintering bird here but there are usually more than I’ve been seeing. The Spider and the Fly nebulas. Readers may remember I posted an image of the Fly Nebula a while back. This is what it looks like at 500mm focal length along with its companion the Spider Nebula. It looks like it could use another 10 hours. The Spider (IC 417) and The Fly (NGC1931) are located in the constellation Auriga, and lie about 10,000 and 7000 light-years away from planet Earth.Last night I tried to image Jupiter again. The seeing forecast was only average but it turned out quite well, I think. I wish I could get a night when the Great Red Spot was on this side. Jones-Emberson 1, also known as the Headphone Nebula. I did this a few years ago with the C8. It took many hours to get anything, this time I used the 500f4 and the IDAS Nebula Booster filter. This is the result after only 3 hours of exposure. It is a very faint and small planetary nebula in the constellation Lynx.
Well, it is 2025 and it doesn’t feel much different. I was in bed by 9 PM last night, as it was too cloudy for astro. I have had a good string of clear nights though. The weather here can be described as boring, nothing happens. It is very nice though.
I still have the C8 mounted and have been shooting some small nebulas and a galaxy. This, of course, is M1, the Crab Nebula, which I haven’t tried for a few years. I have the C8 finely tuned and everything is working great, tracking, guiding, collimation, focus, and this is what happens. A good, sharp image!This is NGC 1931, also known as the Fly Nebula, usually imaged with the Spider Nebula and known as the Spider and the Fly. The Fly Nebula is tiny but with the C8 it actually shows quite a lot of detail. This is the Crystal Ball Nebula, NGC 1514. It is a planetary nebula, less than 2 arc minutes in diameter. Perfect for the C8! This time I imaged it at 2000mm focal length, which I have never tried to do before. I ended up throwing out about 30% of my subs but the image looks pretty good. NGC 1055, a galaxy in the constellation Cetus. It does not rise very high at this latitude. It is around 50 million light years out there. The two bright stars would not be visible to the unaided eye. All of the stars shown here are in the Milky Way Galaxy. The galaxy itself contains billions, maybe a trillion, stars. A Pyyrhuloxia at the golf course, the first one I’ve seen this winter. This Prairie Falcon was at Highway Tank hunting quail or doves, I guess. It flew by a lot of times and I got at least a few good flight shots.
