OR: Two nights in Glenn County: 03/17/2026
Muriel Dulieu Holzer
Second night in Glenn County
Getting ready for the night, I hear the frogs and the field crickets in the pastures. A killdeer flies over us. I am a bit surprised as I thought those were shorebirds only found near the beach. Apparently they live, forage and nest in pastures as well.
The beginning of the night is not going well. My PiFinder did not charge and I scramble to adjust my optical finderscope. Steve and Jim, witnessing my frustration, kindly invite me to come and look at a few objects in their telescope.
M42, The Great Orion Nebula in Orion
The Great Orion Nebula needs no introduction as one of the closest large star-forming regions to Earth, and one of the easiest night sky objects to find and see. It is located about 1,350 light-years away, its size is roughly 65x60 arcminutes and its magnitude is 4.0.
Theta Orionis is the multiple star designation for the stars embedded in the core of M42. It splits into two groups:
Theta1 Orionis is the Trapezium, a tight multiple star system at the heart of the nebula’s Huygenian region, the brightest central core. The four principal stars A, B, C, D, the ones most people know, are arranged in a small trapezoid. With larger telescopes one can see 6 to 8 stars.
Theta2 Orionis consists of three stars A, B, C on a line, each about an arcminute from the next. Theta2 Orionis A is in reality a triple star system. The inner pair A1, A2 is a spectroscopic binary and the third member A3 was resolved using speckle interferometry.
Looking at M42 in the 24”, I could see the four stars of the Trapezium plus two smaller fainter stars E, F near the two stars A and C. A, B, C, D formed a trapezoid with A, E to the left (West), C, F on top (South), D to the right (East), and B at the bottom (North). Looking again in my 18”, I could see only 5 stars. The star E, the companion of the left star A, was visible but not F.
Steve added a night vision device to the eyepiece on his 24”. The model is a PVS-14 Gen 3 (white phosphor). All of a sudden M42 appeared three dimensional with the dust clouds having real texture and the ionized gas shining. It was particularly beautiful.
NGC 2392, the Eskimo Nebula in Gemini
The Eskimo Nebula is a planetary nebula located 2,900 light-years away. Its inner disk is approximately 48 arcseconds wide and its outer halo extends to about 1.5 arcminutes. Its magnitude is roughly 9.1.
Like most planetary nebulae, this nebula is the expelled outer envelope of a dying sun-like star. Its central star is a very hot white dwarf, around 40,000K, visible at about magnitude 10.5. What is particular about this nebula is that its expelled outer envelope consists of two distinct layers. There is the inner shell which is a bright, compact, relatively smooth disk (the “face”), and the outer halo, a fainter, more irregular surrounding ring with filamentary streamers projecting outward (the “fur parka hood”).
The two layers of this outer envelope were created in two different phases. In the first phase, the dying star shed its outer layers in a slow, dense wind over tens of thousands of years. It broke into clumpy knots of denser gas and formed the outer halo. In the second phase, the star collapsed into a hot white dwarf and began expelling a faster wind outward that slammed into the earlier slow wind from behind, compressing and heating it to form the inner disk.
In the 24” with the night vision device, I saw a bloated middle star surrounded by a darker annulus, then a bright ring and then the hood as a bright annulus. In the 18”, I just saw the middle star and a round glow around it. I couldn’t distinguish the two shells. So I tried to add an OIII filter to my eyepiece but it did not improve the view and the middle star disappeared leaving just a round soft glow with no details.
NGC 2467, The Skull and Crossbones Nebula in Puppis
The Skull and Crossbones Nebula, also called the Mandrill Nebula, is an HII emission nebula, a large cloud of ionized gas (usually 70% hydrogen, 28% helium and some heavier elements like oxygen, sulfur, nitrogen, …) and an active star-forming region. It is located approximately 17,000 light-years away, its size is roughly 8x7 arcmin and it is about 7th magnitude.
NGC 2467 is primarily ionized by HD 64315, an extremely hot, spectroscopic pair of O5.5 + O7 stars. Their intense ultraviolet radiation ionizes the surrounding gas and also drives powerful stellar winds that push the gas and dust away from the stars, sculpting the nebula into the forms we see. Based on the ages of these O-type main-sequence stars, the nebula is at most 5 million years old. Deep near-infrared observations have also revealed a population of 125 young stellar objects (YSOs) in the area.
In the 24” with the night vision device and an H-alpha filter, I could see the shape of a mandrill’s face with its bright muzzle, the nose, one wide eye made of a ball of gas and the other eye made of a star. Some hair extended from the top of the head, and some nebulosity came off the left cheek. It was striking.
KTG 33: M105, NGC 3384, and NGC 3389
M105, NGC 3384, and NGC 3389 are a trio of galaxies that fit in the same low-power field. They form KTG 33 from the Karachentseva catalog of isolated triplets. Triplets are considered isolated if no neighboring galaxy within three magnitudes of the brightest member lies closer than three times the separation of the group’s components.
M105 and NGC 3384 are genuine physical companions both at roughly 36 million light-years away and are interacting. They share a hydrogen ring that surrounds them with a radius of about 650,000 light-years, and a mass of 1.8 billion solar masses. This is an immense structure created by tidal forces from their mutual gravitational interaction over billions of years. Moreover, researchers using the Planetary Nebula Spectrograph have identified intragroup stars, diffuse stars stripped from both galaxies by gravity and floating freely in the space between them. They both belong to the Leo I Group of galaxies.
NGC 3389 is roughly twice as far at more or less 70 million light-years away and is almost certainly not interacting in any meaningful way with the other two. It just lies in the line of sight. It belongs to a different group of galaxies entirely, the NGC 3338 group.
M105, or NGC 3379, Elliptical Galaxy in Leo
M105 is the brightest galaxy of the three and one of the nearest giant elliptical galaxies. It has a bright, concentrated central nucleus, almost stellar looking, and fading smoothly outward. There is evidence of a supermassive black hole at its center but otherwise it is just a ball of old stars. It is located roughly 36 million light-years away, its size is roughly 5x4 arcminutes and it has a magnitude of about 9.3.
In the 18”, M105 appeared to the east of the two other galaxies. It had uneven brightness, with its bright center fading smoothly outward.
NGC 3384, Lenticular Galaxy in Leo
NGC 3384 is a lenticular galaxy, meaning it has a disk but no spiral arms and little ongoing star formation. It is a barred lenticular. The bar is made of stars orbiting inside an elongated rectangular structure extending outward from the core through the inner disk. The disk of the galaxy is viewed at an angle and therefore appears elongated. It is located roughly 35-36 million light-years away, like M105, and its size is approximately 5x3 arcminutes. It has a magnitude of around 10.9.
In the 18”, NGC 3384 had uneven brightness with a bright center fading smoothly outward. It appeared in the lower right (northeast) corner in the eyepiece.
NGC 3389, Spiral Galaxy in Leo
NGC 3389 is a loosely wound spiral galaxy. It was observed for the first time in 1784 by William Herschel, and again in 1830 by John Herschel. Dreyer later catalogued these two observations as separate entries, NGC 3389 and NGC 3373, even though they refer to the same galaxy. NGC 3389 has flocculent, irregular-looking arms. Unlike M105 and NGC 3384, it is actively forming stars, 61 HII regions have been identified within it. NGC 3389 looks close visually to M105 and NGC 3384 but it is actually twice as far. Its distance is approximately 72 million light-years. Its size is roughly 2.7x1.2 arcminutes and it has a magnitude of about 11.8.
In the 18”, NGC 3389 was at the top right (southeast). It looked more irregular and fuzzy than the other two galaxies. I didn’t see a bright core.
M1, the Crab Nebula in Taurus
M1 is the remnant of a supernova recorded by Chinese astronomers in 1054 AD. At its heart is the Crab Pulsar, a neutron star spinning 30 times per second that continuously injects high-energy electrons into the nebula producing synchrotron radiation, a non-thermal bluish glow. A neutron star is the collapsed remnant of a massive star (initial mass between 10 and 25 solar masses) that exhausted its nuclear fuel. Protons and electrons were crushed together to form neutrons, creating an incredibly dense object. The outer layers of the star were blasted away and formed the reddish filaments in the outer part of the supernova remnant. The filaments are made of ionized gas. M1 is located roughly 6,500 light-years away, its size is approximately 7x5 arcmin and it has a magnitude of about 8.4.
I took a look at it in the 24” with the night vision device and an H-alpha and OIII filter.
OIII filters enhance the filaments but suppress the synchrotron interior. The gain was pushed and I could see three bright connected filaments forming a loop with fainter filaments coming out of it in all directions. I had never seen the filaments in my telescopes before. Against my expectations, M1 always looked like a smooth grey cloud but not today. Seeing the filaments so clearly was surprising and exciting.
I finally realized that I could plug a battery into the PiFinder directly and therefore find fainter objects more easily with my telescope. Back to the Arp objects!
Arp 336, or NGC 2685, the Helix Galaxy in Ursa Major
I thought at first that Arp’s Atlas of Peculiar galaxies was a catalog of interacting galaxies. But this single galaxy made me realize that I was wrong, it is a catalog of morphologically unusual or disturbed galaxies of all kinds. It has interacting pairs and groups, but also single galaxies with unusual features like this one.
The Helix Galaxy is a lenticular galaxy that is also a polar ring galaxy. A polar ring galaxy is characterized by an outer ring of stars and gas that rotates over the galaxy’s poles, perpendicular to the main disk. In this case, the outer ring is made of thin filamentary strands consisting of knots of luminous star-forming regions and hydrogen gas, with a diameter comparable to the main disk. It was likely formed when a companion galaxy was captured into a polar orbit, its stars eventually merging with the larger system while its interstellar medium remained perpendicular to it. New generations of stars formed from this material to produce the luminous polar rings seen today. These polar rings have persisted for billions of years and are stable. The Helix Galaxy is located roughly 40 million light-years away, its size is approximately 4.6x2.5 arcmin and it has a magnitude of about 11.3.
Looking into Jim’s 22”, with a 13mm and then a 9mm eyepiece, I could see an elongated galaxy with a core, but no dark lanes crossing for the polar rings were visible. Jim and Steve took a look and said it looked disturbed. The perpendicular rings were invisible to me but I could see a glow around it and perpendicular to it. In my 18” with the Baader Hyperion zoom eyepiece 8-24 mm and then with my Explore Scientific 9 mm eyepiece I saw the galaxy, its core and an elongated glow, but no details. The view was much better with the 9 mm eyepiece than the Baader Hyperion Zoom 8-24 mm, the view looked darker and with more contrast.
Arp 25, or NGC 2276, Spiral Galaxy in Cepheus
NGC 2276 appears in the Arp catalog twice, once as Arp 25, as a single peculiar galaxy, and once with NGC 2300 as Arp 114, as part of an interacting pair of galaxies. It is an intermediate spiral galaxy whose bulge looks offset. The elliptical NGC 2300 is its companion gravitationally tugging on NGC 2276’s disk of stars, pulling stars on one side outward and distorting its normal appearance.
NGC 2276 is traveling with an orbital velocity of about 968 km/s relative to the NGC 2300 group of galaxies. Trailing it is a tail of interstellar medium roughly 300,000 light-years long, formed by ram pressure stripping but not detectable visually. Newborn and short-lived massive stars form a bright blue arm along one edge of it on the opposite side of the tail, tracing out a lane of intense star formation. This may have been triggered by a prior collision with a dwarf galaxy, or by NGC 2276 plowing into superheated gas in the galaxy group, compressing gas and triggering a firestorm of starbirth. One of the starburst spiral arms contains an intermediate mass black hole with 50,000 times the mass of the Sun, named NGC 2276-3c. Six supernovae have been discovered in the galaxy since 1962, the third most within the past century after NGC 6946 and M61. NGC 2276 is located roughly 120 million light-years away, its size is 2.2x1.7 arcmin and its magnitude is roughly 12.3.
In the 18” with a 9 mm eyepiece, I saw the two galaxies NGC 2276 and NGC 2300. NGC 2276 was on top and looked fainter. It was larger, roundish, twice as large as the other galaxy. I saw a brightening on its edge away from NGC 2300 towards the nearby bright star HD 51141. I noticed the core was off center. At the bottom of the view, NGC 2300 had a larger and brighter core than NGC 2276 with a round glow around it.
Arp 6, or NGC 2537, the Bear Paw Galaxy in Lynx
The Bear Paw or Bear Claw galaxy is a blue compact dwarf galaxy. It is an irregular galaxy containing an older stellar population of low surface brightness in addition to three large elongated regions of intense star formation that form the paw shape. It belongs to the iE class of Blue Compact Dwarf. Blue is for the light emitted by the massive young stars in the paw shape, ‘i’ is for irregular as the bright knots are distributed in an irregular pattern, and ‘E’ is for the underlying host galaxy that has an elliptical regular smooth appearance. It is located 22-26 million light-years away, its size is roughly 1.8’x1.5’, and it has a magnitude of around 11.7.
It is not known what has triggered the intense burst of star formation. It could result from a previous interaction or merger. Two galaxies happen to lie in the same field of view: NGC 2537A and IC 2233. NGC 2537A is a faint spiral at magnitude ~15.7, 4 arcminutes east of NGC 2537, but its distance from us is 580 million light-years which makes it a background object not a true physical companion. IC 2233, also known as UGC 4278, the Needle Galaxy, is a superthin galaxy seen edge-on, its diameter is at least ten times its thickness. But its distance from us being 26-40 million light-years, it is also unlikely to be interacting with NGC 2537. Nevertheless, NGC 2537 may have interacted with a smaller galaxy that has since been fully consumed and disrupted. Or the starburst could be the result of internal instabilities. If the gas density in a region of the galaxy crosses a critical threshold, it can spontaneously collapse into stars, which happens more often in dwarf galaxies where the gas is not well stabilized by rotation.
Looking in my 18” with a 9 mm eyepiece, I could see a round glow with maybe some dark lanes but I didn’t see the three claws precisely.
Arp 22, or NGC 4027, the Ringtail Galaxy in Corvus
The Ringtail Galaxy is a barred spiral galaxy with one of its spiral arms extended much further out than the other. Its extended spiral arm shines with the light of bright blue stars, indicating a recent episode of star birth. The small galaxy nearby, NGC 4027A, around magnitude 15, is likely the cause of the distortion. It is itself very distorted and shows signs of tidal stripping. NGC 4027 is located 75-83 million light-years away, its size is roughly 3.2x2.5 arcmin and it has a magnitude of approximately 11.1. It belongs to the NGC 4038 group, the same group that contains the Antennae Galaxies (NGC 4038 and NGC 4039).
In my 18” with a 9 mm eyepiece, I saw the shrimp-like shape of the star forming region with its round disk and one broad arm going clockwise.
Arp 82, or NGC 2535 and NGC 2536, Spiral Galaxy and Barred Spiral Galaxy in Cancer
Arp 82 is an interacting pair of spiral galaxies where the smaller galaxy NGC 2536 sits on the arm of its larger companion NGC 2535. These two galaxies passed near each other about 2 billion years ago. The gravitational interactions created a burst of star formation. Another close passage around 20 to 30 million years ago resulted in a second burst of activity that caused “the beads on a string” star formation.
In photographs, the disk of NGC 2535 looks like an eye, with a bright pupil in the center and oval-shaped eyelids. Even-spaced star-formation complexes, the “beads on a string”, form chains along the arms. One heavy arm extends towards NGC 2536 while the other arm extends the other direction into a long tidal tail. Both galaxies are located approximately 200 million light-years away. NGC 2535 is 3.3x1.8 arcmin wide and of magnitude roughly 13.3. NGC 2536 is 0.9x0.7 arcmin wide and of magnitude roughly 14.7.
In Jim’s 22”, I thought at first that the small galaxy was the core of the large one (with its disk invisible) and that the large one was the small one but then I realized my mistake. Both galaxies are fairly faint with the small one a bit fainter. The large one is located near a line of 3 stars. My notes are limited for these two, I vaguely remember seeing the cores and a glow but I don’t remember precisely the shapes I saw. Jim remembers seeing a larger spiral galaxy with a visible nucleus and a smaller oblong galaxy with a bright nucleus.
Arp 281, NGC 4631 and NGC 4627, The Whale Galaxy and the Pup in Canes Venatici
The Whale Galaxy, also called Caldwell 32, Arp 281 (with NGC 4627), and NGC 4631, is a large barred spiral galaxy seen edge-on. It resembles a baleen whale with a pectoral fin, a bright emission nebula for an eye and a fluke-shaped tail. Its central starburst region has produced so many supernovae that they are generating a “superwind” of ionized hydrogen gas blowing out of the plane of the galaxy. It is located 25-30 million light-years away, its size is 17.0 x 3.5 arcmin and it has a magnitude of about 9.8.
The Pup Galaxy, NGC 4627, is a dwarf elliptical galaxy that lies just north of the Whale’s core and is interacting gravitationally with it. It is at the same distance as the Whale, 25-30 million light-years away, its size is 2.6 x 1.8 arcmin and it has a magnitude of about 13.1.
In the 24” with a 13 mm Ethos eyepiece, the Whale Galaxy looked dusty, patchy with uneven surface brightness. Its core looked dusty. It was oriented from 10.30 o’clock to 4.30 o’clock with a star Gaia 1514504050954682752 just below it and its small roundish companion NGC 4627 a little bit further below.
NGC 4656 and NGC 4657, the Hockey Stick Galaxy in Canes Venatici
The Hockey Stick galaxy, NGC 4656, also known as the Crowbar galaxy, is a highly warped barred spiral galaxy that is very long with a bent end, NGC 4657. Surprisingly it is not part of the Arp catalog but it received two NGC numbers as the patch of intense star formation in the bright northeastern edge of the galaxy, the blade of the hockey stick, was considered to be a separate nebula. In reality both NGC numbers are one galaxy with an unusual shape due to its interaction with NGC 4631, the Whale galaxy, and NGC 4627, the Pup galaxy. All three belong to the NGC 4631 group. The Hockey Stick and the Whale are fairly close, roughly 500,000 light-years apart. Moreover, beyond the blade is a fuzzy patch that may be a dwarf elliptical galaxy merging with NGC 4657 and adding a small contribution to the curved tip. The Hockey Stick galaxy is located roughly 30 million light-years away, its size is approximately 12.9 arcminutes long and it has a magnitude around 11.0.
Looking at it in the 24” with a 13 mm eyepiece, the galaxy looked like an elongated stick going from 7.30 o’clock to 1.30 o’clock, with a nearly right-angle bend to the left. The part of it near the blade looked brighter.
M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy in Canes Venatici
To close the evening, we ended with a satisfying view of one of the showpieces of the sky in the 24”: M51. M51, NGC 5194, or Arp 84, is a grand-design spiral galaxy interacting with a smaller companion NGC 5195 or M51b. M51 has two well defined curving arms, at the end of one lies its companion M51b. M51b may have passed through the disk of M51 twice, once 500 to 600 million years ago, and once 50 to 100 million years ago, which has dramatically amplified the spiral structure of M51. M51b is highly distorted as a result and its classification is difficult. It has been sometimes identified as a lenticular galaxy, or as an amorphous or irregular galaxy. M51 and M51b are located 25-31 million light-years away. M51’s size is roughly 11 x 7 arcmin and it has a magnitude of 8.5. M51b’s size is 5.8 x 4.6 arcmin and it has a magnitude of approximately 9.6.
In the 24”, we could see both galaxies in great detail and the view was magnificent. M51’s arms were well defined, sweeping off from the bright nucleus. We could see dust lanes and bright knots of HII regions. A perfect choice to end in a satisfying way, an observing night full of wonders.
Jamie Dillon, DDK
19 Jan ‘06, "great in Ultrablock. Baby Hyades of stars filled with nebula, just E of main gout."
1 Jan ‘08, "also beautiful and complex in Ultrablock. Do like that baby Hyades shape."
then 12 March ‘21 Pinnacles in Johannes the 13", "really is magnificent. Complex patterns of stars. EN fancy unfiltered and with UB, lots of gouts and veins."
Steve Gottlieb
Haffner 18 is a bright, irregular group of stars to the NE of the main region of NGC 2467. Roughly 25 stars are involved in a bright triangular patch of nebulosity. Contains a distinctive 3' line of stars oriented NW-SE, that forms the western facing side of the triangle. A mag 10 star (CD-26 5119) is at the NW vertex and a mag 11.5 star is at the E vertex. The nebulosity has a fairly high surface brightness with a NPB filter.
Haffner 19 is a small group of stars 7' N of Haffner 18, ~3' diameter, and involved in faint nebulosity. Contains 4 brighter stars including one of 11th mag (CD-25 5202). A mag 12.3 companion is 11" NW. A number of faint to very faint stars brings the total to nearly 20, several of which pop in and out over the nebulous hazy background.
Richard Navarrete
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Steve Gottlieb
Steve
Richard Navarrete
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Muriel Dulieu Holzer
Looking at Jamie's description, gout comes a french word, I should have known, apparently it means a blob... Cassiopeia shape is a W star pattern I assume and the baby Hyades a V pattern?
I have asked Claude (AI) how to describe objects better and it gave me a 22 pages document. It is attached. They are pretty general guidelines though, I was hoping for something more detailed with maybe some examples. Otherwise I found this page interesting: https://www.rasc.ca/observing/tips#:~:text=Option%20%231%3A%20A%20basic%20description,with%20the%20guidelines%20offered%20above.
If you have any suggestions to learn to describe objects better, please let me know. I know it is supposed to come with practice and reading other people's ORs but if there is a way to speed up the process, I am all in.
-Muriel
Richard Navarrete
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Jamie Dillon, DDK
Ted Hauter
Muriel, what you very much want to do is slow down the process of observing and describing, rather than speeding it up.Most useful is to sit down, park it every time you look at an object. That light has spent maybe 50 million years getting to your retina, you can give it several long minutes to soak it in.
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Muriel Dulieu
On Apr 5, 2026, at 7:51 PM, Ted Hauter <thgo...@gmail.com> wrote:
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Richard Navarrete
On Sunday, April 5, 2026, 7:47 PM, Jamie Dillon, DDK <ngc1...@gmail.com> wrote:
Muriel, what you very much want to do is slow down the process of observing and describing, rather than speeding it up.Most useful is to sit down, park it every time you look at an object. That light has spent maybe 50 million years getting to your retina, you can give it several long minutes to soak it in.
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Steve Gottlieb
