Pembrokeshire Astronomer

Waldo Stone - photo: Helen Lee We stayed the night out on Rhosfach common, perfect for astronomy, no light pollution, no street lights and plenty of open sky . I was dozing for most of the evening and at around 01h30m I ventured outside to do a bit of Leonid fishing. Within a couple of minutes a sporadic meteor was spotted out towards Orion, followed quickly by a sporadic over near Gemini. It was cold outside with a slight breeze, but not noticeably freezing. Within the next minute  I spotted my first Leonid, a moderate to fast moving streak of greenish tinged flame shooting  towards the Plough. This classic shooting star was unmistakeably a Leonid, the ionized trail was some 5 degrees in length and eminated from the direction of Leo. I only stayed outside for about twenty minutes, in that time I spotted six meteors, only two of them were obvious Leonids. After twenty minutes the cold night started to bite,  time to get back to the warmth of the camper van.

June 14th 21h15mUT Maksutov 90mm x100 AIII/IV Out towards the south west, Jupiter stood all alone, in a beautiful clear darkening sky. The Great Red Spot (GRS) was in mid transit at 20h51m UT tonight. By my clock it was just past 21h05m UT, I was in luck and quickly grabbed the Mak90. After a couple of minutes setup I was observing the Jupiter dance.  The GRS was easily seen; just about midway on Jupiter's disk. The seeing this evening was terrible, I was surprised to have seen anything of the GRS. A good night for naked eye and maybe binoculars, not a good night for telescopes. Sometimes it's better to just put away that telescope, find a dry patch of land, lie down and simply look up at the stars. Tonight is one of those nights.

June 4th 03h15m UT x125  Mak90 -  Diam: 15.8" (via-Double glazing filters) A few mornings ago I tried my hand at Mars observing... through one of our bedroom windows! Not my first choice of observing methods, but I wanted to see how "bad" Mars could be, as viewed through a "double glazing" filter. Setup of the 90mm Mak was easy and within a minute, via a 10mm eyepiece, I was sailing over Mars, looking at a wonderfully massive south polar cap. The dark band adjacent to the polar cap was easily seen. Mars at the moment has to it a slight gibbous phase, which was easily picked out at x125. It would have made more sense to go outside and view the red planet, but I was half asleep and didn't feel like dragging myself out into the garden. Something which I will remedy over the next month or so.  By July I expect to be camped out on some distant hill in Pembrokeshire, unwilling to move until this Mars opposition is over! June 4th

Last night's planetary sketch of Jupiter.   22h00m UT Antoniadi II/III  Skywatcher  90mm Maksutov x125 It was great to be outside last evening under the stars.  Even better to be able to grab a decent sketch of the planet Jupiter, with the added bonus of capturing the Great Red spot. 90mm Maksutov telescope That "mighty" Maksutov 90mm telescope is able to deliver great views of the planetary features, and considering its small aperture, I'm well pleased with the final results.  This little scope, so far; has returned some lovely images of double stars, craters of the Moon and now I find that Jupiter is also holding up well...  I hope Mars is as good in July.

"Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them" Marcus Aurelius. Recently, whilst spying Algeiba through the Maksutov, I noticed to the south west and low over a nearby roof top, that familiar of constellations " Corvus " the raven, or crow as it is also called.   It is also known as the " Spanker " due to its resemblance to a type of boat sail.   The constellation may be named Corvus, but to my eyes, it looks nothing like a big black bird! Few of the constellations take on the actual shape they depict, but in the case of the "Spanker" the stargazers of old were spot on.   Is that a spanker sail.? maybe~maybe not! It's good to see Corvus again, a sure sign that summer will soon be calling.

Screenshot of Mercury from WinJUPOS software March 16th 2018 - 19h15mUT The sky was full of lingering clouds, big black Venus and Mercury obscuring clouds! It took a little time for my cloudbusting to work, but finally the bulk of the cloud parted to reveal a brilliant Venus, and just above and slightly to the right a glorious and very welcome Mercury. It must be three years since I last spotted the winged messenger. Due to the often cumulus filled horizons of this county and probably most counties in the United Kingdom, Mercury remains hidden from view for much of its possible observing season. To the southwest a cloud bank was moving ominously westward, by the look of the formation I had maybe a five minute window to catch a peep of this fiery Sun hugging planet. The Maksutov came to mind, light weight, portable and easy to set up. Setting up on the garden bench was easy, with a 10mm eyepiece in place, red dot finder trained , I was up and observ

"Some nights have been  wholly unfriended of the stars of late". Joseph H. Elgie author of " The stars night by night". Of late, the  nights of Pembrokeshire have definitely been "unfriended" of stars! Between the mist, rain and snow blizzards, astronomy has taken a back seat this past month or so. But never mind, tonight looked perfect for stargazing.  Several of the Little Bear stars were on show, a welcome sign of a possible good night's viewing. Maksutov 90mm/f13.8 Catadioptric It was time to take out the little 90mm Maksutov. As big bright Orion was well placed ,first light in the viewfinder went to the uppermost star in Orion's Belt, Mintaka, a lovely white primary with a slightly bluish secondary.   The trapezium's  four stars next, all perfectly round shining white, not a hint of flare or fuzziness. Rigel's secondary was difficult to locate tonight, but it was possible to pick out its obvious