10/22/2025
We had a very successful night at public viewing Monday night.
Before sunset (and well before opening to the public) we thought it would be an extra and rare treat to try to find the comet "Lemmon". Since it is an object potentially taking up a large field of view, and because the two main telescopes are usually reserved for other objects, we thought we'd set up at least one of the observatory's 4" Meade scopes outside and dedicate it to viewing the comet for the evening. Shortly after sunset then we trained the scope where the comet ought to be and, voila!, it appeared in the field of view right away! This was good luck since the comet has not yet become visible with the naked eye. Then, inside we found the comet with the 16" as well, in order to have several scopes available for viewing in the brief time we had before the comet would set. So that was the first order of business.
Saturn was rising in the Eastern sky so we trained the Clark 11" refractor on the planet, with great success. The very novel thing about Saturn this year is that it's rings, from our perspective, are "edge on," meaning that what you can see right now is a thin, sharp line right through the middle of the planet, which gives the impression that Saturn is being barbequed like a round roast on a spit. Rare, in more ways than one! Also, in the same plane several of its moons were clearly visible.
The last object we pursued was the Andromeda Galaxy, our nearby twin galaxy. The big fuzzball of the central part of the galaxy was unmistakable. One of these nights we'll mount a camera body onto the 16" and take some long exposure photos so that we can demonstrate what the whole galaxy looks like. Come back and see for yourself.
We had a very good crowd of about 25 skywatchers. We love to see so many first-time visitors of all ages, but we also can't help but notice that we are generating our own informal club of repeat visitors. This is wonderful. Please join our growing club next month.
