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Observations of objects of type "Open Cluster":

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Wed Sep 4 03:55:00 2019 UT   Obs. no.: 2118

This evening, I observed four M objects with my 10X50 binoculars. The first objects I observed was M8 & M21 in Sagittarius. M8 is a really great nebula with a group of stars right next to it while M21 is an open star cluster. In Andromeda, M31, The Andromeda Galaxy, only showed its bright inner core for me. The grand finale, was M45, The Pleiades, which showed its blue stars beautifully. It was another great night of viewing!

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Sun Dec 30 00:30:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2085

This evening I observed a small cluster of stars that was just above the Hyades & below the Pleiades. I counted six stars in this cluster as I viewed it in my 10X50 binoculars.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Sun Dec 30 00:30:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2084

This evening I observed a small cluster of stars that was just above the Hyades & below the Pleiades. I counted six stars in this cluster as I viewed it in my 10X50 binoculars.

M41 (Open Cluster, in Canis Major)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Tue Dec 11 03:30:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2083

Last evening, my brother Anthony & I attempted to see the comet that is approaching Earth. Unfortunately, we did not see the comet. We did see the Hyades, Pleiades, & many objects in the Orion Constellation. We also got to see the M41 open cluster just below the bright star of Sirius. Finally, we saw our first Geminid meteor whose amber color showed its chemical composition to be sodium. This weekend, we will try to see the comet when it is closest to Earth.

M41 (Open Cluster, in Canis Major)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Tue Dec 11 03:30:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2082

Last evening, my brother Anthony & I attempted to see the comet that is approaching Earth. Unfortunately, we did not see the comet. We did see the Hyades, Pleiades, & many objects in the Orion Constellation. We also got to see the M41 open cluster just below the bright star of Sirius. Finally, we saw our first Geminid meteor whose amber color showed its chemical composition to be sodium. This weekend, we will try to see the comet when it is closest to Earth.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Thu Oct 18 05:15:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2075

On the early morning of 10/18, I viewed both the Pleiades & the Hyeades with my binoculars. The sky was clear & stars in both open clusters really jumped out at me. The head of Orion then started to peak over the trees & with my binoculars, I was able to see a grouping of stars of Orion's head. It was a very good night of observing.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Thu Oct 18 05:15:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2074

On the early morning of 10/18, I viewed both the Pleiades & the Hyeades with my binoculars. The sky was clear & stars in both open clusters really jumped out at me. The head of Orion then started to peak over the trees & with my binoculars, I was able to see a grouping of stars of Orion's head. It was a very good night of observing.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Fri Aug 24 04:30:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2071

This evening, I observed the close encounter between the nearly full moon & Mars. Mars is still very bright orange now that the global dust storm is settling down. I also observed M31 & M45 with my mounted binoculars. M31's core was rather faint but M45 showed very well. All in All, a very nice night of viewing.

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 18-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Branford, Connecticut, United States
Time: Sun Apr 22 01:00:00 2018 UT   Obs. no.: 2051

This evening, my brother Anthony & I went to a local star party. Even though the moon was a waxing crescent, we were able to have good views of 6 galaxies. We started with M104, The Sombreros Galaxy. Its dust lane cut right across the galaxy. Next we viewed M51 & its companion galaxy that is merging with it. We were able to see the spiral effect of M51. Next, we viewed M81 & M82 at the same time. The dust lanes on M82 were very obvious & the spiral effect on M81 was impressive. Finally, we viewed M63 & saw a great dust lane going through that also. M44 The Beehive Open Cluster was the best thing I saw tonight. We also viewed M13, M92, M42, Venus & the moon itself. It was a nice night.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Wed Oct 4 04:15:00 2017 UT   Obs. no.: 2031

Last evening, before I went to bed, I observed The Pleiades & Hyades with my 10X50 Binoculars. Most of the Pleiades contain hot blue stars which are still close together since their birth. The older Hyades cluster has more cooler yellow looking stars that are spread more out from each other. The Hyades also have a few binocular doubles within the cluster also. Red Aldeberon is an old dying star that is much closer to us & is not a member of the Hyades Cluster.

M29 (Open Cluster, in Cygnus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 127-mm other   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: severe   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Thu Aug 31 01:15:00 2017 UT   Obs. no.: 2025

This evening, my brother Anthony & I viewed a few objects with my 127mm MAK. The highlight of the evening was our observation of the open cluster M29. We were able to see many stars in the cluster. We also viewed the galaxy M31 but all we could see was the core of the galaxy. We also viewed Saturn & with its rings wide open, it was a great sight. Saturn also had a close pairing with the moon.

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 127-mm other   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Wed Apr 19 01:00:00 2017 UT   Obs. no.: 2005

This evening, my brother Anthony & I viewed open clusters M41,44,35,36,37.38 & 67 with our 5" MAK. M44 was the best out of all the open clusters we looked at. We also saw one of Jupiter's moons right after it emerged from behind Jupiter. We also viewed a few galaxies but the view was not good for them.

NGC869 (Open Cluster, in Perseus)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindpsring.com)
Instrument: 10-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Glenside, PA, USA
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: good   Seeing: fair
Time: Thu Sep 20 04:30:00 2012 UT   Obs. no.: 1883

Viewed the Double Cluster in Perseus with a Meade UW 2" ep yielding me 40x @ 1.75 degrees FOV. Hundreds of stars down to magnitude 12 or better visible even in moderate to almost severe light pollution. The 2 main knots were clearly visible with a scattering of other individual stars in between and around.

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 127-mm other   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Mon Nov 2 06:50:00 2009 UT   Obs. no.: 1837

Early this morning I observed M44 the Bee Hive Cluster with my 127mm MAK and 12mm Televue Eyepiece. The Bee Hive was a beautiful sight in both my telescope and my 10X50 binoculars. But on this day the Bee Hive had a special guest. The planet Mars was sitting on the edge of M44. One of the Bee Hive stars sat very close to Mars to add to the effect. When I aimed my scope at Mars I was able to see its northern ice cap with little difficulty. On the morning of Nov. 3rd Mars will still be embedded in the cluster so anyone will still have a chance to see Mars in the Bee Hive.

M38 (Open Cluster, in Auriga)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindspring.com, web: http://www.joecaggiano.com)
Instrument: 10-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Glenside, Pa, USA
Light pollution: light   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Wed Feb 18 01:00:00 2009 UT   Obs. no.: 1814

The "seeing" was not as good today as it was yesterday while viewing M81 and M82. Still, it didn't make too much of a difference with this globular. Though hardly visible through my 10x50 finder, M38 exploded into hundreds of stars forming a bright cross-shaped pattern at 40x. Blue and gold stars peppered my view. I have taken a picture of the core since I could not fit the whole globular into view with my camera. I have posted pics on my webpage.

M73 (Open Cluster, in Aquarius)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 16-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Milford, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Sat Aug 9 01:30:00 2008 UT   Obs. no.: 1796

This evening my friends Steve Borer, Rob Masud and I attended a local star party given by our local astro group the Astronomical Society of New Haven. One of the first things we viewed was Jupiter with Greg's 16" Dob. The south equitorial belt surprised all of us with its reddish appearance. I've never seen the SEB look so red. The north equitorial belt was very lumpy looking because of the festoons on it. Some of the deep space objects we observed included two galaxies M51 and M31. All we could see was the cores of these galaxies becausen the skies were not good for galaxy viewing. However, M11 The Wild Duck Cluster and M57 The Ring Nebula were truly outstanding. We also viewed four globular clusters, M4, M13, M22 and M73. Every time I observe M4 I have to wonder whether it's a globular or open cluster. To me it looks more like an open cluster. M13 and M22 both showed many individual stars through the 16" dob. But my favorite globular turned out to be M73. This globular was so densely packed, seeing individual stars was next to impossible. However, the big highlight of the evening was the bright X that was on the terminator of the first quarter moon. The X on the moon is the result of the tops of certain crater rims being exposed by the sun. This results in a perfect X which appears during a first quarter moon. Finally we were able to see satallites and the Persiad Meteor Shower in the sky above us. Lightning flashes in the distant horizon comleted our very enjoyable evening.

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 20-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Milford, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: light   Transparency: good   Seeing: good
Time: Sat May 24 01:00:00 2008 UT   Obs. no.: 1786

This evening my friends Steve Borer, Rob Massau and I went to a local star party to view several Messier objects through a 20" dob. The first object we observed was M44 the Beehive Cluster. This cluster had a very special guest called Mars on its northern edge. One of the cluster stars was very close to Mars and this combination looked like a close binary star. We observed two globular clusters, M4 and M13. M13 showed numerous individual stars and it was quite spectacular. Many stars were also seen in M4. M57 the Ring Nebula surprised us by showing us its interior star. It's very hard to see M57's interior star but conditions were perfect for us to see it. We also observed three galaxies, M81, M82 and M104. We were able to see the spiral effect of M81 and and the dust lanes of both M82 and M104. They were both easy to see. We also trained our scope on Saturn. We were able to see a belt of Saturn and the shadow cast on Saturn's rings by the planet. We then were treated to a fine view of the ISS as it passed by at about -.5 magnitude. Finally when we were on the way home we saw Jupiter and the moon rising together in the southeastern sky. What a great night we had!

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 35-mm binoculars   Location: Stratford, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: poor   Seeing: fair
Time: Fri May 23 02:00:00 2008 UT   Obs. no.: 1785

This evening my friends Steve Borer, Mike Dzubaty and I observed Mars entering the Beehive Cluster. All we had with us was 7X35 binoculars but we were able to see Mars sitting on the east side of M44. On Friday night Mars will be on the north side of M44 and I will have better binoculars to observe this event.

M45 (Pleiades) (Open Cluster, in Taurus)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars   Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Wed Apr 9 01:00:00 2008 UT   Obs. no.: 1772

This evening my friends Joey Maltese, his wife Cindy and I observed the crescent moon seeming to bump up against the Pleiades Open Star Cluster with my 10X50 binoculars. The crescent moon was lying on its back and was showing a lot of earthshine. Just above the upper left hand side of the moon lay the Pleiades. Seeing these two objects next to each other was very impressive.

NGC869 (Open Cluster, in Perseus)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindspring.com, web: http://home.mindspring.com/~jcaggiano/)
Instrument: 10-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Glenside, Pa, USA
Light pollution: light   Transparency: excellent   Seeing: good
Time: Sun Aug 12 06:20:00 2007 UT   Obs. no.: 1697

Spotted the double cluster in Perseus. This was indeed the highlight of the night. At 48x, I have never seen so many stars in this region. With the added aperature of my older scope, I could easily pick out the color between the cluster's blue stars and the background orange and yellow stars. It was a massive conglamoration!

M44 (Praesepe) (Open Cluster, in Cancer)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 18-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: Milford, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: fair   Seeing: fair
Time: Sat Apr 21 01:00:00 2007 UT   Obs. no.: 1639

This evening my friend Steve Borer and I joined about 30 other people from our group The Astromomical Society Of New Haven for an informal star party at a Milford Ct. beach. The first object that we looked at was the crescent moon. The earth shine was very bright and to our surprise, we were able to see Aristarchus crater and its ray even though it was deeply imbedded in the earthshine. Next we visited Venus which is still a waning cresent at about 55- 60%. The cloud deck had some darker patches in it but they were subtle. When we turned the 18" dob on Saturn, we saw four moons. There was one band that was visible on the planet. Everyone including the children were all stunned by the Orion Nebula despite its being low in the western sky. We tried to split two double stars with the 18" dob. Sirius proved to be too low in the sky to be able to be split but Polaris was a tight but comfortable seperation. We observed two galaxies M104 and M82. M104 was disapointing and we were not able to see its dust lanes but M82 showed quite well and we could see its many dust lanes quite easily. With a 40mm eyepiece in the 18' dob. we viewed M44 the behive cluster. This was a truly great object to observe. We were able to see small groupings of stars within the entire cluster. Believe me when I say this was my greatest view of the behive I've ever had. All in all it was a great get together among friends.

M41 (Open Cluster, in Canis Major)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 10-inch Dobsonian reflector   Location: North Guilford, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: light   Transparency: good   Seeing: good
Time: Sat Jan 27 00:00:00 2007 UT   Obs. no.: 1617

This evening, my friends, Mike Dzubaty, Steve Borer and I went to a school to join three other friends in order to show grammer school kids the sky through our telescopes and binoculars. We had a nice seabreaze which helped cool the temperatures to a confortable 10 degrees above zero. We showed the kids the terminator of the moon which really oohed and aahed them. As usual, the Orion Nebula was a big hit as well as several open clusters in the area. What surprised me was how much the kids were impressed with M41 open cluster. Finally, the kids looking at Betelgeuse really impressed them. Afterword, we retired back to the building for brownies, cookies and hot chocolate.

M35 (Open Cluster, in Gemini)
Observer: mihai mataringa (e-mail: mihaimataringa@yahoo.com)
Instrument: 7x50-mm binoculars   Location: Constanta, Romania
Light pollution: light   Transparency: good   Seeing: good
Time: Fri Dec 15 18:45:00 2006 UT   Obs. no.: 1601

Faint but easy object in 7x50 binos.Start from mu Gem-eta Gem-M35.Two stars resolved with averted vision.

M37 (Open Cluster, in Auriga)
Observer: mihai mataringa (e-mail: mihaimataringa@yahoo.com)
Instrument: 7x50-mm binoculars   Location: Constanta, Romania
Light pollution: light   Transparency: good   Seeing: good
Time: Fri Dec 15 17:50:00 2006 UT   Obs. no.: 1600

Lucky evening!Unexpected power outage,soI took my binos for a brief tour.Starting fom beta Aur I find M37 and M36 in the same field,aprox.4degrees between them.Faint,still no problem to observe.More difficult seems to be M38,very faint,irregular,using averted vision.

M29 (Open Cluster, in Cygnus)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindspring.com, web: http://home.mindspring.com/~jcaggiano/)
Instrument: 70-mm binoculars   Location: Glenside, Pa, USA
Light pollution: moderate   Transparency: good   Seeing: good
Time: Wed Sep 13 02:00:00 2006 UT   Obs. no.: 1563

Cygnus was directly overhead while viewing. It was a cool night in the upper 40's and the atmosphere was still. I took in the vast star fields of the Milky Way that run right through Cygnus. Viewed stars through the binos probably down to 9th magnitude. A Beuatiful sight!

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