Resources

If you’re interested in bagging Messier Objects, and in particular if you’re interested in doing the Messier Marathon, I have some suggestions:

• If you don’t have binoculars, get a decent 7X50 or 10X50 model. Binoculars are almost indispensable in hunting down and viewing Messier Objects. If you’re on a budget, the best models I know of are the Orion Scenix, which cost under $100. You can check them out at http://www.telescope.com. 
• You don’t have to have a large scope to bag every object in Messier’s list. All of them can be viewed with a 4” refractor, although a 6” or larger scope reveals a lot more detail, particularly if you’re observing from a site with some light pollution.
• Observe the Messiers from the darkest skies you can get to. Many of the objects have low surface brightness, and any light pollution at all makes them very difficult to see.
• If you don’t have a Telrad, get one. Using the Telrad bullseye makes finding Messiers about ten times easier than trying to find them with just an optical finder. Don’t buy one of the Telrad imitators like the Rigel QuikFinder. Go for a real Telrad. You won’t regret it.
• If you have a PC and don’t have a good planetarium program, get one. One of the best I’ve found is the free program Cartes du Ciel, which matches or beats most of the commercial programs. You can download it from http://www.stargazing.net/astropc/. There are numerous free catalogs available for it that cover everything from nebulae to double stars. I wouldn’t be without it. I used it to generate the graphics you saw tonight.
• If you want to run a Messier Marathon, Harvard Pennington’s book, The Year-Round Messier Marathon is indispensable. And, as he says in the book, you can run your own marathon any night of the year. This is the single source that I’ve found most useful in learning to find and observe the Messier Objects.
• Use your web browser to visit Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS) at http://www.seds.org/messier/. This is the single most comprehensive site on the web for information about Messier and his objects. Much of the detail I presented tonight was based on information from SEDS. There’s a lot more there, including detailed information and many images of the various objects. Another valuable web site is the home page of the Astronomical League, at http://www.astroleague.org/. They run numerous organized observing clubs, including the Messier Club and the Binocular Messier Club. Yet another potentially useful source of information is http://www.messiermarathon.com, which appears to be under construction, but already has some useful information.

I should have the content of tonight’s program up on my web site within the next few days. The home page for that information will be http://www.ttgnet.com/astronomy/messier.html. The home page, at least temporarily, for our new organized observing sub-club will be http://www.ttgnet.com/astronomy/ws-al.html.