Despite some lousy weather, clouds, wind, ect., I’ve been getting some astrophotography done. Birding is still slow. There hasn’t been anything exciting for a long time. Although it did get hot for a couple of days, it didn’t seem to bring out the herps, probably because of the extreme dryness. The Round-tailed Ground Squirrels are out and they cannot find anything green to eat on the ground so they are climbing the mesquites and eating the leafs and bark.
I started this weeks ago and just finished up last week. NGC 4565, the Needle Galaxy. It has been a few years since I tried this, one of my favorite galaxies. A large and bright galaxy, it is out there 40-50 million light years, in the constellation Coma Berenices.This is one I did just to see what it looks like. Often called the Penguin and the Egg, NGC 2936 is the larger galaxy, interacting with the elliptical galaxy NGC 2937. Both are very small in our view from Earth and very distant. There is a smaller galaxy on the left, PGC 1237172. It is an unrelated bluish irregular galaxy or edge-on spiral galaxy. It is located around 230 million light years away, making it closer to the Earth than the NGC 2936 collision. This image is a very heavy crop. Here is another galaxy I haven’t tried for years, M64, the Black-eye Galaxy. A very colorful galaxy, it is a mere 17 million light years out there, also in Coma Berenices. NGC 4244, also known as Caldwell 26, is an edge-on loose spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici. It is part of the M94 Group, a galaxy group relatively close to own Local Group containing the Milky Way, Andromeda, and Triangulum Galaxies. It is only about 14 million light years out there. I just discovered this in Stellarium last night. It is a planetary nebula, very small. The nickname is the Lawn Sprinkler Nebula, and for once I can see why! Officially NGC 4361, it is a Wolf-Rayet star creating the nebula, the star is only 6% the size of our sun but 18,000 times brighter. It is found in the southern constellation Corvus, about 3000 light years out there. I would like to add a lot more exposure to this but for now, this is what I have, about an hour. Here is another example of colliding galaxies, NGC 3227 is the larger galaxy, NGC 3226 is the smaller eliptical galaxy. Tidal tails of stars being pulled from the galaxies fill the spaces around the galaxies. Very faint and dim, about 70 million lights in the constellation Leo.And now a few birds. Here is a hybrid Cinammon Teal/Blue-winged Teal at Lake Ajo. A flock of American Avocets showed up a few days ago, and some got close enough for a fairly decent photo. A dispute being resolved by two male Great-tailed Grackles. My FOS Yellow Warbler, at the golf course.
One reply on “March Astro”
Amazing asto images. Thanks for a wonderful season. Here’s to hoping for more rain this
summer. See you in the fall!
One reply on “March Astro”
Amazing asto images. Thanks for a wonderful season. Here’s to hoping for more rain this
summer. See you in the fall!