Suffolk Sound with Jules Button

Just finished my monthly astronomy chat with Jules Button on Suffolk Sound: as always a delightful (if brief!) session. One of her listeners asked about the famous 'X and Y' features on the Moon. These illusions are created by sunlight and shadow for just a few hours each month when the Moon is at its first quarter phase. The terminator (the divider between light and dark) passes through crater fields near the centre of the Moon's disc - you can just see the effect with a small telescope mounted on a tripod: I took my photos with a 300mm prime lens on my DSLR

I've already posted brief notes about the night sky and ISS in July (scroll down!) but you can hear the broadcast HERE for a week or two.

Cley and Hickling: a short run out

Despite feeling absolutely washed out and feeble, I volunteered to take some of Linda's wax wraps up to Cley, joining Norman and Brian for the morning. To be honest, there wasn't much new about, but I did add Greenshank to the year list! Other birds included a delightful rusty Marsh Harrier, Bearded Tits, a Red Kite, Little Gulls and Great Egrets.

After coffee we headed home, stopping en route at Hickling. The sky had grown a little threatening, so we decided on a quick trot to the end of Brendan's Marsh. Here we were rewarded by a flock of twelve typically dozy Spoonbills (with another half a dozen in the nesting trees) another Great Egret, a couple of Cranes and a very confusing Marsh Harrier. Through the gloom it looked a lot like a juvenile Osprey: it was only an enlarged image on the laptop at home that revealed the bird's identity.

The night sky in July

With nights being so much shorter in mid-Summer, celestial goings-on this month mostly take place just before sunrise or just after sunset: there are a few conjunctions and a few opportunities to catch a glimpse of six planets (Neptune will be occulted by the Moon on July 29th at 4.00am, but you'll need a good telescope to see it!)