An observing report

I was just reading the previous thread about observing reports and thought I would post something. I went out to Portal, AZ Friday night for the new moon, took along my 9.25 SCT and had a great night there. I have been working on observing the Caldwell objects for some time, and Caldwell 51 has been very difficult. Despite several tries I have never seen this object, until Friday! Caldwell 51, which is IC 1613 is a dwarf irregular galaxy in Cetus. It is an extremely difficult visual object and is only visible as a subtle brightening. Despite being listed as Magnitude 9.2, this ranks among the most difficult of visual observations I have made. In fact, once I had the correct star field, it took several minutes and slowly panning around to detect the brightening. All this from skies with a limiting magnitude of 7+ (Portal is one of the darkest locations in the US)!

I observed several galaxies in Fornax, as well as NGC 1049, a small globular cluster in the Fornax Dwarf Galaxy...I also made a couple sketches. If you would like to read my whole report, including a Saturday visit to Rancho Hidalgo near Animas, NM to see Clyde Tombaughs personal 16 inch telescope, check out my astronomy blog: lostpleiadobservatory.blogspot.com

The blog is something I have just started so I welcome your comments.

Alan

Ala,
Thanks for your interesting report. Perhaps you could also share a bit more about Portal, AZ. I'd also like to know what eyepiece(focal length,power etc) you were using to make your observations.

Thanks for the report!

I have also once observed NGC1049. I was actually trying to spot the Fornax dwarf galaxy with a 12.5-inch scope under excellent skies, but I could only see the globular cluster.

Inge S