Last night and early this morning were eventful for stargazers who knew when and where to look. Barry Halevy snapped a great photo of a SpaceX Falcon 9 Dragon cargo launch from the Cape to the Space Station this morning around 6:33. Its northeasterly path made it visible low in the eastern sky at Balsam. […]
A rocket and a meteor Read More »
Last night an almost total lunar eclipse turned the full moon blood-red due to the refracted light from the sun through the earth’s atmosphere. Lunar eclipses are more common than solar eclipses but due to the much larger size of the earth, are visible over much wider areas and take hours to complete. I had
Photographing the solar eclipse from the Atlas World Traveler proved to be more challenging than I expected. The captain did a great job of keeping the ship slow and steady but with a long lens I had to keep making adjustment to keep the sun centered. There was also a steady headwind and a few
More solar eclipse photos Read More »
We found dozens of pipevine swallowtail butterflies in the garden this week. They are sucking up nectar in preparation for mating and laying eggs in late summer. Also taken with a Canon R6 and 200-800 zoom.
I took dozens of photos of two hummingbirds fighting to occupy our feeders. They moved too fast to get them both but while one was resting nearby I got a good image with a 800 mm zoom on a Canon R6.
Ruby throated warrior Read More »
I tired to capture videos as Venus passed behind the moon (ingress) and came out the other side an hour later (egress) but gremlins got in the way. First, the big telescope’s PC got trapped in drive update hell. I grabbed the Dwarf Mini (see previous blog post on this remarkable tiny ‘scope) and aligned
A somewhat rare occultation of Venus by the moon will occur at 3:53 this afternoon. It should be visible to the naked eye if you can find a wall to block out the sun. Binoculars or a small telescope would be best. Be careful not to look near or directly at the Sun. See Spaceweather
See the moon eat Venus Read More »
All the bird songs are getting louder and earlier as summer approaches. There are multiple phone apps that will identify birds by listening to their calls but they don’t give you a long term ideas of what species are active. I recently installed a bird identification device called Birdweather PUC that connects to your home
Birds, birds, birds! Read More »
May 10th, 2024 was a night I will never forget. A X-class solar flare made a direct hit on our planet and sparked aurora as far south as Cuba. Fortunately skies were mostly clear and there were early warnings from observers in southern Europe that a major event was in process. Millions of photos were
Two years ago the sky went wild Read More »
