AstroGab

Astrophotographers hangout. Invite friends and notice chat bar on bottom.

As the title reads, I'd like to hear some stories from the road. Visits from animals, alien encounters, weather, equipment failure...red necks....you get the idea.
I image primarily from the nice light polluted confines of my backyard but I had the opportunity to image from my parents house in rural Maine which raised the above question.
I look forward to all of your stories from the sticks!!

Views: 214

Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Great topic!

Just the other week, sitting in my my tiny little backyard imaging. Have like 12 feet from my backwall to the back fence and three feet of that is short bushes. So anyway, as I image, I come out, check on things, and then go back in the house. Well, while I was inside, a small animal, most likely a cat, decides to come up and take residence in my little bushes right next to my set up. I come back out, sit down at the computer and wait for eyes to adjust. Even if my eyes were adjusted properly, no way I could have seen the animal there in the dark with all those plants. Anyway, long story short, lens caps falls off table, and into the bush. I bravely and blindly thrust my hand into said bush, startling the before mentioned animal which promptly freaked out and took off through the brush scaring the b-jesus out of me. Nearly pee'd myself.

t
Just love it when critters try to check things out in the middle of the night, especially when you are half asleep. I had a possum climb up on the fence in my back yard which got my attention (I chased it away with my car ;)). I'd like to hear more, I know a lot of you fellas carry gear to remote places. Any one ever hear banjo music in the middle of the night?

Here is my experience while living in New Port Richie, Florida.:
December 29, 2010 I was video recording the eclipse of the Moon. Had the equipment set up in back of the condo which is situated by a lake. It was around 9 PM. I glanced behind me and saw these eyes looking at me about 15 feet near my feet. It was a alligator about 8 foot long. I went inside and waited for it to leave. It didn't so I moved my setup to the side of the building. Around midnight the lawn sprinklers came on and got me wet up to my waist. I moved the gear outside of the area being watered. At 2:30 AM the eclipse of the moon began and I was tracking it manually using my crutch tripod. Yepper, right during the middle of the eclipse, the moon disappeared. There goes my manual tracking! I never had an occasion before where the moon disappeared during an eclipse. I should have stopped recording for the duration of the moon disappearance but I kept trying to figure what happened. When it reappeared I was off by a moon width. I finished the video and never looked at it again. Perhaps I will play it on http://nightskiesnetwork.com but I better preview it first.
Thanks Steve for the opportunity to share one of my many experiences.

Nicholas...you moved your gear with the gator still out there? You are braver than I my friend, the gear would have stayed where it was, lol!

Yeow gaters! I'd be calling it a night myself...

I don't get out much in this weather here a little cold but my 2nd last outing we had a full moon and I was viewing a star cluster when my friend asked if he could see it as I moved to the side of my scope I noticed a shadow , when I turned around to see what it was there stood a coyote, I think he was trying to decide which one of us would make a better meal me being the bigger one of the 2 of us, I made a decision he wasn't having either of us so I ran at it to chase it off , he ran out around behind me and turned to stare me down again so , I ran at it one more time to chase it off and away it went. They are getting big here up to 65 LBS and not scared of people now either

Well that doesn't make me feel too good when I camp by myself all the time with 20-30 coyotes within a mile or so. They are damned loud.

There's always a lot less coyotes than it sounds like. They are always near me when i'm out on my deck as well, as it's a big national park my house overlooks. Coyotes, and occassionally the slivering somethings and the occassional animal being attacked under my deck. grrrr.

Don't think your need to turn the fan on!!! LOL

Think Trevor and i in such amazing skies we couldn't tell which star was Polaris so we didn't know how to set up. LOL. Hawaii has some incredible skies.

Jan 2011 I had an imaging night of pure insanity. Just about everything that could possibly go wrong, went wrong. Rather then re-write it here, I'll post a link to the original write up:
http://www.myastronomyjournal.com/journal.php?id=nheacock&jd=20...

There were a few fun comments at the bottom of that post.

-Neil

RSS

About

© 2024   Created by Charles Dunlop.   Powered by

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service