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Podcaster:  Shane and Chris

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Title: Objects to Observe in the July 2022 Night Sky

Organization:  Actual Astronomy

Link :  https://actualastronomy.podbean.com/

Description: The Actual Astronomy Podcast presents Objects to Observe in the July 2022 Night Sky and places a focus on events to help you find the planets as well as the Moon. This month we have several pairings and some occultation events with the Moon and Planet. We also talk about when and how to observe the Lunar Straight Wall, Curtis Cross as well as what comets and asteroids to look out for this month plus an AAvSO variable star to watch pulsate in Scutum.

Bio: Shane and Chris are amateur astronomers who enjoy teaching astronomy classes and performing outreach where they help the eyes of the public to telescope eyepieces.

Today’s sponsor:  Big thanks to our Patreon supporters this month: Rob Leeson, David Bowes, Brett Duane, Benett Bolek, Mary Ann, Frank Frankovic, Michael Freedman, Kim Hay, Steven Emert, Frank Tippin, Rani Bush, Jako Danar, Joseph J. Biernat, Nik Whitehead, Michael W, Cherry Wood, Steve Nerlich, Steven Kluth, James K Wood, Katrina Ince, Phyllis Foster, Don Swartwout, Barbara Geier, Steven Jansen, Donald Immerwahr

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Transcript:

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very interesting. So, yeah.

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So yeah. All right. Good stuff, good stuff so do you want to record another show. And we’ll talk a little bit more about this.

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Yeah, sounds good. All right, let’s record, and I have the transcription running our members because we have to put this one on three.

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Perfect. Alright,

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welcome to episode, 236, no wait is this 235 or 236, this is 235 at the actual astronomy podcast, the objects to observe in the July, 22 night sky, I’m Chris and joining me assume your amateur astronomers who love looking at the night sky in this podcast

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is anybody else likes going out under the stars so yeah I got a little bit confused there shame we’re working on a whole pile of episodes. At the same time, and I’ve kind of got them all teed up like planes, ready to take off from the tarmac.

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Yeah, it’s, well, it’s a busy time, and I think we’re going to try to fit in a few more recordings, then maybe we usually do just so that we can maybe have a day off over the summertime.

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Yeah and brings it up to some observing because we have you know some observing plans that will otherwise, eat into our recording Kayden saying, Yeah, well in.

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Now that July, June 21 is behind us the days start to get light well the night time gets longer and the daytime gets shorter. And that means darker skies for us again because we’re, we’re still in this perpetual Twilight but at least we’re now coming

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out of it, and we’ll have dark skies pretty soon yeah hopefully hopefully So, do they see you bought the jumbo pocket Atlas, or didn’t like by somebody bought it I you guys put me in that group chat and then I couldn’t figure out who bought it.

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Yeah I purchased it, as well as another recent ad is that Missy marathon Field Guide, which is awesome but yeah the, the jumbo pocket sky Atlas is the exact same charts, as the pocket sky Atlas from sky and telescope which is probably one of my favorite

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in the field guides to use.

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But the nice thing with the jumbo edition is it’s just everything’s bigger so it’s easier to read. And, you know, as, as I age up, I find that I’m struggling a little bit more at night to read some of these star charts.

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So, the jumbo edition is great.

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It’s the one that I have is hard covered I’m not sure if you can get a soft cover version or paperback.

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But it’s coiled so you know you can Okay, you can open it up and just like fold the cover on itself, and you know weight wise it’s not too bad but it’s it like I think it’s the ideal size for for me anyway in my eyes to be using at the telescope.

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So I basically got three versions of the sky outlets you know I’ve got the pocket sky Atlas got the jumbo pocket sky Atlas, and then I have like the desk one that’s laminated that’s gigantic, and that’s not one you can use right at the telescope like

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you need a table for that you go look at those Yeah. So, this one is just really good the the paper quality feels like it’s a heavier bonded paper, and it has a bit of a, like a shiny or finish to the pages.

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So I think it’ll like you know it’s not do proof, I’m sure, but I think it’ll withstand do yeah a lot better than than the, you know, the pocket sky Atlas that I have because it’s all wrinkly from getting wet and that kind of stuff so yeah right now.

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I’m saying that the jumbo pocket sky Atlas is a big recommend on my part, I think I’m going to really enjoy using this. Yeah, so this is the jumbo pocket Atlas by Skype from sky and telescope magazine and it was out of print for a while now it’s now it’s

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back in print and yeah we have no relationship with sky and holes and guessing.

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Although we did just have a guest on who who writes for sky and telescope magazine I’m just a regular subscriber and and and you know some of the contributing writers and and really, really enjoyed the articles that they write and that’s how I do a lot

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of my observing it’s, it’s a lot of fun.

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One thing I’m going to note though Shane and you’re doing this as well as we tend to prefer actually using the physical star charts, under the nighttime sky no that’s how I observe I think that’s how you observe what why do we do that over observing say

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with with software on a, on a iPad or cell phone or computer what why do we use physical star charts with red lights instead of instead of using digital technology when, when it’s so widely available to two big reasons for me.

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Number one is often I find the digital stuff to be too bright.

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And I know you can get overlays and you can tune the lighting and all of that kind of stuff on your phone or tablet.

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But I still usually find them just too darn bright, and sometimes even when you do all of that tuning, sometimes like it doesn’t apply to a lock screen or something like that so you still get blasted by you know some white light right times.

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And so yeah, I just don’t like it for that. And then the other aspect is a lot of these devices don’t do well when it’s cold out, and in the summertime, it can get kind of chilly.

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Yeah.

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So you know there’s that, and maybe even a third one here is like these devices are not inexpensive and I don’t want to drop one on the ground, especially I’m observing like you know my summit patio.

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Yeah. So anyway, the book, you know, a book with a red flashlight is ideal for me, or like a physical medium it’s just, it works, and it you know removes all those other issues.

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Yeah, I’m gonna, I’m going to chime in with another comment on why I, I like to use them it’s fairly simple one and that’s that. When I first took a computer out or a cell phone out or, you know, different device out into the field.

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The one thing I noticed was that you can zoom in and out infinitely, which is amazing when you’re sitting at home and you’re sort of exploring the universe and trying to figure out what you want to what you want to take a look at, and I thought well this

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is going to be amazing out in the field, but there were two things one of them you already mentioned, which is that, as we age, or I works different at night, and those screens aren’t designed to be used at night, not just for brightness, but also for

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things like image scale and resolution and all of that stuff. And when you go and buy a printed out with something like the jumbo pocket Atlas from from sky and telescope is they have thought through that, and that although when you when you open up in

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the daytime, you’re not going to notice this as much, but the print quality the weight of the stars and the lines and everything are drawn are actually drawn to show up well when you have your little dim red flashing on and at night so it actually makes

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it really easy to to use the outlets to navigate with the stars.

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really easy to to use the outlets to navigate with the stars. The other thing. Go ahead. I was just gonna say that’s a great point. Yeah, yeah.

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The other thing and this never occurred to me this was actually around the time when digital technology came out and I was messing around with Bernards star charts and I was printing off digital versions, and I was laminating them and taking them out

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into the field to use. And the first thing I noticed compared to software.

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Because this the astronomy software is really coming out as I was getting into astronomy, I just assumed that’s what I was going to be using under the stars.

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But the thing that I recognized almost immediately is that people that are making star charts are doing it in such a way that the scale, from where your eyes to the chart is they’re trying to sort of guesstimate that scale of looking up at the sky maybe

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if it’s like a more basic chart or the types of instruments that you’re going to be using, and the types of magnification is you’re going to be using either as a finder, or as a low power IPS in a small telescope.

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trouble to figure out that scale, but when you take out the software, you have to play with it to try to figure out what that scale is and it’s kind of like learning to use a focus or something and I could never figure out like I spent a long time messing

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around with like the zoom level and Samantha, looking at something and I keep zooming in and then I get lost and other when you’re sitting at home and a nice comfortable room.

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It’s all good but when you’re out and it’s minus three or minus 10 and you’re trying to mess around with this stuff or even in the summer when it’s plus three your plus 10.

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It gets a little bit frustrating. And so what I tend to do is you know as I just mark my pages with the stuff I want to look at. I turned to it and then I’ve got little sticky notes beside the object I want to look at.

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And then I go read to it but the the software doesn’t doesn’t really seem to be able to replicate that experience yet at this time maybe it will but it just doesn’t quite do it from yet so like you I have lots of star charts and and can’t wait to see

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what the jumbo pocket Atlas does under the next game for you. Yeah, yeah me too I’m, I’m excited for it.

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And I’m excited because I received a two inch adapter for my comet catcher. Yeah, that’s awesome. I’m, I’m also for that yeah yeah so I took a 1982 or 84 cel a strong orange to that was me when I was, you know, in elementary school.

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I just bought it used for a couple hundred bucks and turning it into a wide field machine by buying various adapters until I found the right one to meet the modern two inch well crafted eyepieces to an f3 and a half system.

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So, yeah, very excited for that. All right, let’s talk about what people can see this month I’m really excited for July to roll around on the calendar because the sky will be getting dark again and we’ll be back in the park, doing some dark sky observing.

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Yeah, exactly. July, kind of, marks the return to dark sky observing for us, and I’m super excited for two. Yeah, that will come along until after first quarter which is on the, On the seventh.

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So kind of throwing something a little different and I was looking at this because I’m the editor for the RSC observers calendar and July 3 actually gives you the opportunity to see Arcturus before sunset during the first week of July.

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Have you ever tried other than the sun, cuz cuz I want to go there, but other than the sun. Have you ever tried to see a star during the daytime, not a star No I’ve observed the planets like, yeah, it’s Jupiter, Saturn, during daylight, but not, not a

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star No. I’m trying to remember I might have seen, and I didn’t have it down I think someone hunted down, serious once and showed it to me through, through a telescope but that was a long time ago, our tourists that first week of July, always have to be careful

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if you’re taking a telescope before sunset not to not to catch a glimpse of the Sun through the telescope course that will cause immediate damage, but I believe during the first week of July, it’s, it’s possibly Arcturus can be a personally far away from,

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from the sun and probably what you can do is use when you go to telescopes or something like that to get in the field but you have to be very careful because of course, when the sentence up to, we’re not pointing a telescope at the sky at all.

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Yeah, it can be dangerous but, that’d be a nice observation to be able to catch a star during daylight or Twilight.

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Yeah.

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On July, 7 oh that’s when you have the first quarter moon and hopefully the start of of when it actually is getting dark. And then the lunar straight wild is visible that night so first quarter moon scene, always sort of need to see it hanging in the

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nighttime sky and one thing I’m going to recommend to people before you talk about the straight world is, is if you’re a person who’s never used binoculars on the night sky or maybe, maybe you have.

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It’s always really amazing just to take your binoculars and appoint them and that first quarter moon or sort of looks like a half moon in the sky, because you can see a lot of craters and then read along the edge of where the illuminated portion meets

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the an illuminated portion which we call the Terminator but that’s always a pretty big blast to do even for us experienced amateurs.

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Oh yeah, absolutely lots to see it never gets boring. If you have a little telescope though you can see the lunar straight well so what is the lunar straight while Shane and how can people see it on the moon around the July 7 day.

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The Lunar straight wall is, again, it’s a clear obscure effect meaning, kind of a shadow play with the way certain areas of the moon are illuminated versus in shadow.

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And essentially what this is is a ridge on the moon in a very flat area.

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But at certain times of the month, the way the sun casts a shadow, it looks like somebody just took a, like a sharpie marker a black marker and drew a almost a perfectly straight line, and through a telescope it’s, It’s really neat to see and it’s also

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quite large. So you really can’t miss it if you’re out observing on July the seventh.

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It should be quite, quite interesting and with all of these clever obscure effects. The other thing to remember is that it does change minute by minute although you probably won’t detect it.

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But, as, as the, the angle of the Sun is changing and it’s just constantly changing, so do these effects evolve in terms of their appearance. So, if you are observing the lunar straight wall on the seventh observe it kind of early and you’re observing

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and then come back to it periodically and just see if it’s changed at all in terms of how large it is or any of the other characteristics that you see. So summers coming and, you know, you might be enjoying a popper so does the state’s or some sort of

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other beverage and you know if you’re sitting around at home you have a nice coffee table.

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You know, you need to put it down. Now, if you’re from the East Coast who might say you need an East coaster to put your beer on, but on the July 13 the full moon is going to cause some large tides for those on the coast and that can be, you know, something

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really to take a, take a look at I know it was always fascinating growing up, you know, watching those larger tides and lower tides, you know, particular interest because you’d be able to walk out in the mud flats in front of the front of the place where

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I grew up with this always kind of interesting to go out there and try to pull up some razor clams or dig for some regular clams and and go through that kind of intertidal experiment when you’re a little kid is always a lot of fun.

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I’ll take your word for it. I’m a brewery boy through

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July 14, we have Saturn four degrees north of the moon. Now, we’re going to have a lot of pairings of the planets and, and the moon, which other we’re getting towards, and we’re around Full Moon they’re being on 13th and just after it’s it’s still going

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to look more or less full for, for the better part of four or five days after Full Moon, so too bright really to do any deep sky observing. But what I always like at this time of year is that Moon is sitting nice and low sort of in that saddle portion

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of the ecliptic guy. Mm hmm. Yeah.

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Oh, sorry. No, go ahead. I was just going to say yeah, quite low and, you know, very The best thing of the moon is it’s the easiest object to find in the sky when it’s up so it, it makes for a great anchor point for some of these close pairings with planets.

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Exactly. So by being able to find the moon so easily.

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You’re going to be able to find things like July 14 Saturn and the moon.

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Just four degrees apart and four degrees. If you hold your arm up at arm’s length, or if you hold your fist up at arm’s length, your fist is going to cover approximately, it’s going to span sort of 10 degrees the nighttime sky.

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So if we’re talking about four degrees, it’s just under half of that, and most binoculars are going to easily encompass four degrees. So, if you just take your binoculars out, look at the moon, because the moon is going to be pretty bright and has a lot

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of glare to it, binoculars are going to help cut through some of that and to to reveal these planets close into to adjust about full moon. Mm hmm. Yep.

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On July, 18 Neptune is going to be three degrees north of the moon.

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And then on July 19 just one night later, Jupiter is going to be two degrees north of the moon that should be easily visible just with your eyes alone.

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And then, on, on the 20th we have last quarter and I just got to put this in for fun was Pluto is at opposition in Sagittarius so that. Yeah, that, that can be a bit of a bit of a stretch to ever see Pluto before it’s pretty faint.

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Yeah, you know, I, I’m I don’t think I’ve actually done the proper way to observe Pluto which Pluto’s extremely faint. So the only way to observe Pluto because it will look like a very faint star is you match up the star field, and you record where you

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think Pluto is within that star field, and then you come back days later to see if it’s moved and if it’s moved, you can then say I’ve observed Pluto.

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So I’ve never really done that I’ve pointed a telescope where it should be. Whether or not. I’ve seen it, I don’t know, probably not. Yeah.

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Yeah, I’ve, I haven’t done it myself properly but I’ve observed with people who have, and they pointed it out to me through the telescope and okay see that triangle of stars and then the one to the right of the try that’s Pluto and that’s kind of how

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I’ve seen it and yes, it looks exactly like an extremely faint 14th magnitude star. Yeah, not that exciting. Yeah, not that exciting unfortunately but yeah Pluto larger of the dwarf planets.

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I’m one of the larger of the dwarf planets. On July, 20 of course that’s also when we had the last quarter moon so after that then we’re into nice dark skies now that meets up pretty nicely here because you know that’s really when about we start to get

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a couple, maybe even a few hours, or real darkness that you can actually do some really productive deep sky observing with. Yeah, yeah, it’s, it’s when I start to get excited again.

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Yeah, so there was south of us of course when she got much south of 50 degrees you know you do gain quite a bit of darkness for every, you know, hundred or so miles.

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So if you go so for those you know that are that are below 50 degrees north, then they’re probably still having having darkness and never losing the night sky completely like we do.

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July, 21 we have Mars three degrees so for the moon and there’s an occultation for Japan, just mentioned this because I do know we have listeners in Japan so just mark that on your calendar, see if there’s not occultation for your point, there’s a few

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other places that you can see occultation from, but not North America, and I’ve just kind of go through and just kind of keep a general tally of where listeners are writing from and so if they do note that something is happening in one of those areas,

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then I’ll try to market but no I think that was the only place. On July, 22nd though, Uranus is going to be a cold by the moon so the moon is going to pass in front of Uranus, and that’s for South America and Europe, and I do know we have observers and

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both of those locations, and then also on July, 22.

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The Lunar Curtis, x is going to be visible. And did you ever take a look at that I can’t remember I feel like I did try to hunt it down one night, and.

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And now I forgot I think it was like a year or so ago.

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Yeah, I don’t know if I’ve chased this one.

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I can’t remember i, this does not stand out to me so I don’t think I have yeah I think it’s another one of those clear obscure effects where it looks like there’s an accident combination of a couple of craters on the moon.

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But if you happen to have nice clear skies. On July, 22 maybe you’re out looking for either the Uranus occultation or on that night I mean Uranus is going to be extremely close to the we think it’s like less than half a degree away for us here in central

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North America.

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But on that note as well you could check out CP can see an ex pattern along the Terminator which is the night, where the night and then the daytime zone means on the moon that shadow line that’s called the Terminator, and that’s where this x will be visible.

00:20:35.000 –> 00:20:52.000
Yeah, yeah. This one goes by another name of the Curtis cross as well it look okay yeah just in case anybody was was wondering but yeah it. I guess it probably just depends on your orientation, it could be an X or across.

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Very cool.

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July 26 Venus is going to be three and a half degrees so moon.

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Of course that’s going to be, you know, getting close to sunrise.

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So, you know, exercise that again that solar passion whenever you’re observing when the sky is going to be bright and, and we do always caution not to observe when the sun is above the horizon.

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Or if you do so use extreme, extreme caution not to be pointing anywhere near the sun, and on July 28 that is our new moon and I think around that. I think that’s where we’re heading down to the grasslands to do some dark sky observing that weekend with,

00:21:31.000 –> 00:21:35.000
with the park. Yeah, we can’t wait for that.

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Hopefully we have some good weather and some good skies for it, but what time of the year we usually we do the biggest threat.

00:21:42.000 –> 00:21:55.000
In mid summer for us is sometimes smoke from forest fires and grass fires, you know, from all around so it was certainly an issue last year but we’ll see how this one pans out.

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Yeah, I can see just a little bit smoke right now actually in the sky from promote here in Lake Country kind of things so hopefully it does blow away I know it’s kind of coming and going.

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Some days are exceptionally clear, and then some days just have a tinge of kind of sort of is obscuring the 10 degrees closest to the horizon, but that I’m time you looked up directly overhead it’s fairly blue so fingers crossed that those fires get extinguished

00:22:19.000 –> 00:22:26.000
I know we’re having these big rain storms that are coming through. So, I think they just need to hit a couple more spots and we should be in the clear again.

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Huh. Yep, exactly.

00:22:28.000 –> 00:22:46.000
On July, 29 now this year. You got to plan a little bit ahead folks so July 29 that’s going to be the Delta Aquarius meteor shower, and why we’re raising this to people’s attention Shane is because two weeks later, you know, this is just the day afternoon.

00:22:46.000 –> 00:22:59.000
Two weeks later, you’re going to have full moon again, roughly, to be clear, and. And that’s when the Perseids take place you won’t be able to see the Perseids very well Paul this year because the proceeds are going to occur really close to the August

00:22:59.000 –> 00:23:12.000
full moon. So this is sort of our replacement meteor shower this year is July, 29 to be on the lookout for the Delta Aquarius meteor shower and there can be quite a few meteors associated with that one as well.

00:23:12.000 –> 00:23:24.000
Yeah, and it’s great when it aligns with the new moon because many of us amateur astronomers will be out just doing general observing right and when you have a meteor shower happening it’s just like bonus and, you know, it’s quite nice to see these streaking

00:23:24.000 –> 00:23:25.000
through the sky.

00:23:25.000 –> 00:23:36.000
And I think because the Perseids tend to last over, over really a couple weeks, your chances of seeing some Perseids and then I think there’s even some, I don’t remember.

00:23:36.000 –> 00:23:40.000
Rick who observe this sometimes I think he’s going to try to condense them server this this year.

00:23:40.000 –> 00:23:57.000
He’s a real Meteor a rock star, I guess. And anyway, he, he knows all these obscure meteor showers and was telling us but this Meteor Sharon that meteor shower and there’s a few that kind of overlap right at the end of July, so you don’t need to know

00:23:57.000 –> 00:24:05.000
all the exact ones that you’re going to look at I don’t think I’ll ever know that he was going on and on about all these different ones it’s super cool to have somebody out in the field telling you these things.

00:24:05.000 –> 00:24:20.000
But at the same time yeah we’re just seeing lots of meteors coming in right at the end of July and, and that new moon being around that time is going to you know make your place to be able to see lots of meteors I think I actually took a couple days off

00:24:20.000 –> 00:24:26.000
days off around that, just so I can go out and enjoy this meteor shower. Yeah, that’ll be great.

00:24:26.000 –> 00:24:36.000
It’s the best time of the year for us to do that kind of stuff just due to the the warmer temperatures and, and it’s just easier you know it’s it’s enjoyable.

00:24:36.000 –> 00:24:47.000
Yeah, yeah no really excited that’s Friday. Yeah, so I think it’d be good to book it off. Anyway, I’ll be under dark skies, that morning, and and taking a look for, for meteors hundred percent for sure.

00:24:47.000 –> 00:25:01.000
I’m really looking forward to it. The supposed to be cleared, you know, past couple nights we’re supposed to be decent but it rained so I’m really hoping that that the clear skies do start to come around once again once we’re in the dark but hey, it’s

00:25:01.000 –> 00:25:13.000
okay if it rains now what we’re still waiting for the skies to darken down a bit. So, Shane let’s talk about comments little bit we still have a couple comments poking around their own the night sky.

00:25:13.000 –> 00:25:29.000
We have comet 2017 key to pan stars which is, you know, really just a little bit brighter than 10th magnitude 9.7 magnitude right now, making its way through a few cuz heading towards Scorpius, but it’s actually not too far from tourists tourists plenty

00:25:29.000 –> 00:25:48.000
of hobby that the Brian was talking about in our previous episode so go ahead in any comment brighter than 10th magnitude starts to become more intriguing for amateur astronomers, you know, small telescopes will show it, and you know sometimes you can

00:25:48.000 –> 00:25:52.000
start to see some detail in terms of like puffiness.

00:25:52.000 –> 00:26:03.000
Sometimes maybe a little bit of an elongation to represent the tail so, yeah, anytime there’s a comment, like I said, that’s starting to breach brighter than 10th magnitude I become interested.

00:26:03.000 –> 00:26:12.000
Yeah, and I think for anybody who who’s listening to this that that is 50 and, and has pretty good dark skies.

00:26:12.000 –> 00:26:15.000
You know when this podcast gets released.

00:26:15.000 –> 00:26:31.000
I would encourage you to go especially if you have like a 12 or 16 inch instrument. I think the larger the instrument, I think probably if you get into like a 16 inch instrument under a really dark sky, you’ll be able to see some detail on this because

00:26:31.000 –> 00:26:38.000
a few weeks back Mike and I were observing it with his 12 inch and we could definitely see some detail.

00:26:38.000 –> 00:26:47.000
At that time, so I think this is a particularly interesting almost 1092 comment typically I’m not that interested in 10th 92 comments.

00:26:47.000 –> 00:26:59.000
But this one, I think, is displaying a little bit of detail for those to have the larger instruments so well worth checking out if if the, If you’ve got that.

00:26:59.000 –> 00:27:11.000
All right, so I’m just fixing a spelling error in my notes here I just noticed that I spoke July run all over the place but it’s not gonna matter anyway because we have the transcription running, which probably spells July wrong every time.

00:27:11.000 –> 00:27:30.000
We also have comet c 2021 p for Atlas, which will reach perihelion, at the end of July, and it’s predicted to reach a maximum brightness of magnitude nine around that time so there you go that’s another reasonably bright comment just put it into your

00:27:30.000 –> 00:27:49.000
you’re going to put that into your astronomy software, where you can go to Sky calm and take a look at, at the Finder chart for that. So, in these notes Shane I put in a variable star for the month I don’t know if you This came to us from the ABS so didn’t

00:27:49.000 –> 00:27:55.000
know if maybe you want to take it away with the variable star. Sure yeah so this is near me 11 and screw them.

00:27:55.000 –> 00:27:59.000
It’s one variable star that you can see this month.

00:27:59.000 –> 00:28:04.000
So it’s our sky in the constellation screw them.

00:28:04.000 –> 00:28:11.000
So, when the English observer EP show, maybe the center of the car. Yeah, 95.

00:28:11.000 –> 00:28:16.000

  1. So this was the discovered 1795.

00:28:16.000 –> 00:28:21.000
And at that point in time it was one of only a few known variable stars.

00:28:21.000 –> 00:28:29.000
At its brightest it’s a fairly easy star to see, even at its Dennis though some 50 times dimmer.

00:28:29.000 –> 00:28:35.000
You can still see it with some optical aids so using binoculars would reveal it.

00:28:35.000 –> 00:28:47.000
It’s pretty easy to find it being it lies just a degree northwest of the wild cluster so it’s one of the more famous messy objects. It’s a beautiful cluster to look at.

00:28:47.000 –> 00:29:00.000
And it has its name because the bright stars in the cluster form of V, and if you’ve ever noticed migrating birds especially geese, if you’re from our region.

00:29:00.000 –> 00:29:08.000
You know they form these huge V’s in the sky when they are migrating, you know, from, from the south and then back home here.

00:29:08.000 –> 00:29:11.000
Cool. Yeah. Okay.

00:29:11.000 –> 00:29:23.000
There’s a little more here so our sky is the brightest class of variable stars called RV Tory’s stars, after the prototype, or first start to be determined of the class.

00:29:23.000 –> 00:29:29.000
Such stars or small group of yellow super giants that are thought to be near the end of their life.

00:29:29.000 –> 00:29:38.000
They may provide us with information about the evolution of stars as a transition to wake dwarfs in their life cycle.

00:29:38.000 –> 00:29:52.000
Visually, they were characterized by alternating patterns of deep and shallow minimum periods of minimum brightness, our sky has a period of about 144 days of you know between kind of maximum and minimum brightness.

00:29:52.000 –> 00:29:59.000
For example, every fourth or fifth minimum is exceptionally faint for reasons that are not well understood.

00:29:59.000 –> 00:30:11.000
The star seems to be pulsating and at least two super imposed periods. This is possibly due to shock waves within the star itself, or their interaction with the surrounding cloud of gas and dust.

00:30:11.000 –> 00:30:19.000
I think the biggest takeaway here Chris is that we still have a lot to learn about a lot of stuff in the sky.

00:30:19.000 –> 00:30:23.000
And, in particularly.

00:30:23.000 –> 00:30:39.000
You know the lifecycle of different classes of stars. You know, there’s still a lot of research being done to understand that, and the variable star observers do help with some of that science by contributing light curves, which is that minimum maximum

00:30:39.000 –> 00:30:44.000
as the stars go through their different brightness stages.

00:30:44.000 –> 00:30:50.000
Cool. And I didn’t know if we have any good double stars for this month.

00:30:50.000 –> 00:30:56.000
Well, there’s always, there’s always a bunch of double stars that are out there.

00:30:56.000 –> 00:30:59.000
You know lira, there’s the double double.

00:30:59.000 –> 00:31:06.000
This is what’s really interesting about these stars it’s two pairs of doubles.

00:31:06.000 –> 00:31:11.000
So you end up seeing for and they almost look like two sets of twins.

00:31:11.000 –> 00:31:18.000
And they can be a little challenging to split sometimes you do have to use a good amount of magnification to get that split.

00:31:18.000 –> 00:31:22.000
But that’s one that I would recommend.

00:31:22.000 –> 00:31:30.000
What else would there be. I think we talked a little bit about graphene, maybe last week or the week before.

00:31:30.000 –> 00:31:40.000
That’s another one that is quite interesting because it’s a three star system. And, you know, pretty much any small telescope will split.

00:31:40.000 –> 00:31:57.000
Two of them but the AB stars in that three star system are very, very close and you probably would have to run at least 200 times magnification and maybe use a larger aperture telescope as well to split them but it’s a neat little system and I recommend

00:31:57.000 –> 00:31:58.000
that one as well.

00:31:58.000 –> 00:32:00.000
Cool. Excellent.

00:32:00.000 –> 00:32:13.000
Anything else to add to this or objects to observe and in the July, 2022 night sky, what are you hoping to get out taking a look at this summer once we get into some dark skies again yeah no great question.

00:32:13.000 –> 00:32:17.000
First of all, nothing to add. I think this is a really good summary.

00:32:17.000 –> 00:32:21.000
As far as what I want to observe.

00:32:21.000 –> 00:32:30.000
So, my observing style is changing a little bit. I’m now trying to observe with my Bible viewer almost exclusively.

00:32:30.000 –> 00:32:44.000
So I do want to spend some time with the Bible viewer under dark skies, but observing some deep sky objects that I’m quite familiar with. So I want to look at, you know, the double cluster.

00:32:44.000 –> 00:33:03.000
A lot of the Messier objects, just to see how they appear with that binary viewer. So I need objects that I I’m familiar with. So I think it’ll be doing some of that, but I’m still intrigued by Stephen James O’Meara hidden treasures book in the objects

00:33:03.000 –> 00:33:21.000
that he looked at so he used a four inch refractor which is what I use. And it’s really neat just to look at some of those objects because you know the thing with the night sky is there’s, there’s so much to see and I think, at times, we get a bit of

00:33:21.000 –> 00:33:37.000
a bias for like really large really bright objects and those are great to look at, but I think sometimes we overlook some other really good objects, you know, that or sometimes even near these other great objects so the hidden treasures, I think focus

00:33:37.000 –> 00:33:47.000
a bit on that sort of category you know often overlooked, things that are really cool even in a four inch telescope. Cool. Yeah.

00:33:47.000 –> 00:33:50.000
And, and for me I’m working on.

00:33:50.000 –> 00:33:54.000
Well I put up a list a number of years ago.

00:33:54.000 –> 00:34:08.000
In the rec observers handbook club Wide Field wonders, and you know one thing I’ve always kind of hoped to do is revisit that, and I thought it’d be great if I could do sketches of the time I was I was still learning sketch and my sketches weren’t that

00:34:08.000 –> 00:34:16.000
that great but I think they’ve, they’ve come along fairly good since then it’s been about, I think about nine years since I first put that out.

00:34:16.000 –> 00:34:31.000
And the other thing is, is that I had hoped to find like Astro photographer to actually take some images of this stuff to give a really good presence and I know some people have sort of taken some photos of them just as they work through the list.

00:34:31.000 –> 00:34:47.000
And then, you know, recently, I’ve been receiving just a few sort of random Astro photos from people that that include those objects and other objects and I thought, you know, could be a good opportunity for me to kind of go through and revisit revisit

00:34:47.000 –> 00:35:01.000
those I think there’s like about 40 objects or something like that, over the next year and properly sketch those and then just there’s so many more people doing Astro photos right now that you know I wouldn’t kind of have to find like that dedicated person

00:35:01.000 –> 00:35:16.000
I you know I think I might be able to thread through the Astro photos that that people are sending me in album format oftentimes have many, many things, and be able to find most of those and then maybe get the odd person to take a shot and kind of put

00:35:16.000 –> 00:35:23.000
those together in a little bit better of a, of a compendium of really interesting Whitefield objects.

00:35:23.000 –> 00:35:35.000
Yeah, that sounds really interesting. Yeah, so that’s a little project and like I said I’ve, I’ve kind of recently cobbled together, a really old inexpensive.

00:35:35.000 –> 00:35:49.000
Wide Field telescope, sort of, as a bit of a fun project to do this spring and, you know, kind of excited to kind of see what would it might be able to do so, yeah, looking, looking forward to that and as well as always taking a look at the at the Summer

00:35:49.000 –> 00:36:05.000
Milky Way which use the when we get down to the grass and we usually kill pretty good part of a night just cruising up and down, you know, sort of that magical bright white milky Milky Way in the star clouds, we can see from dark skies and, yeah, yeah

00:36:05.000 –> 00:36:08.000
the there’s nothing better really.

00:36:08.000 –> 00:36:13.000
Then, then pending through the Milky Way. It’s just, it’s incredible in the summertime.

00:36:13.000 –> 00:36:42.000
Excellent, anything else to add thing. That is all. Alright, well thank you thanks everybody for listening, and be sure to subscribe to the actual astronomy podcast and your podcasting software, and we’re always excited to get your observing emails and

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365 Days of Astronomy
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