Stargazing 2024-12-20: Pleiades (publ. 2024-12-21)

We have had at least a half dozen clear nights in the last two weeks or so, I'd guess. But most of those nights I was much too tired to go out. I did, however, have two very brief sessions which produced some unimpressive sketches. I may possibly upload the better of those two sketches, which involved a small area in Leo, but I'm not sure if I want to bother with it.

Last evening (2024-12-20) circumstances were more ideal, and I was able to go outside with the boys for about an hour. I started to look around for some obscure target which I had never observed closely before, but then I realized that, to the best of my memory, I had never done a sketch of the Pleiades. Here is the sketch, after the touch-up work:

sketch of Pleiades

That sketch was done using my usual 12x60mm Skymaster binocs. I used Stellarium to identify the brighter stars.

I had trouble several times with the binocular eyepieces frosting or fogging up — not sure what is the correct word in this case — when they got close to my face. But I realized that if just left them alone for a minute, the moisture would evaporate back off. The outdoor temperature that night was 0 deg F. This time of year, a really cold night is -20 deg F, and a warm night would be +10 deg F or warmer.

Copyright

CC BY-SA 4.0 Deed