Well, I didn't think I'd be making this post but here it is - tonight I have managed to see the Horsehead Nebula, Barnard 33
The sky here tonight is the best and darkest I've experienced for a long, long time. The transparency is excellent although the actual seeing is mediocre in terms of star images, splitting doubles etc.
M31 is a direct vision naked eye object and notably extended too. The double clusters in Perseus are clear without any sort of optical aid as is M35 in Gemini and the brighter 3 star clusters in Auriga. I don't know what the naked eye limit at the zenith is - probably close to mag 6 ?
This is as good as it gets from my back yard.
By 12:30 Orion was well above the rooftops and the streetlights have gone out. Neighbours have gone to bed and there are no lights on in our house or any in the vicinity. It's all "come together" for a change and my 12" dob is definitely the right instrument for these conditions.
I've been trying to see the Horsehead Nebula for a few years now. I've got to know the star field around the star Alnitak (lowest of the "belt" stars) well and I've read the advice pages on the target plus reports from those who have seen it many times.
All lights off. Laptop screen is dimmed, curtains are closed tight. I spend 20 minutes outside just looking around the sky, getting as fully dark adapted as I can.
First stop on the path to the Horsehead is NGC 2024, the Flame Nebula, which is right next door to Alnitak. Good start tonight - the Flame Nebula was not only visible without a filter, but the dark rifts that run through it, like the branches of a tree, were also visible. Even the dazzling Alnitak in the same field of view could not drown out the illuminated lobes of the Flame.
Ok, time to add the Astronomik H-Beta filter to the eyepiece of choice for this search, the 24mm Panoptic. Filter in place, I was pleased to see that the Flame Nebula,it's shape and form were still quite visible. Time to push Alnitak and the Flame out of the field of view and to concentrate on the 1 degree of sky that is home to the Horsehead Nebula.
There are 3 stars that frame this patch of sky on one side, one of which is bathed in faint nebulosity which this evening was visible with and without the filter. This is NGC 2023, a faint emission and reflection nebula. I had seen this before but not as clearly as it was showing tonight. Another hopeful sign.
Now the big challenge. I knew that the key to seeing the Horsehead Nebula was to detect the faint glow of the emission nebula IC 434 but in previous attempts this was the fence that I'd fallen at (Horsehead - get it ??!! ). Tonight though, as my eye adjusted to the filtered light across the field of view, the elongated but rather amorphous band of slight cloudiness that is IC 434 gradually became apparent, varying in density here and there, almost not there sometimes but re-confirmed subtly over and over as my eye swept around the field of view.
And there it was. A bay, an intrusion, a dark overlay, a piece of IC 434 was missing !. Quite a large piece as well or so it seemed as my eye moved from one side of the field to the other bringing various degrees of averted vision into play. It's been described as a dark thumbprint and I'd concur with that. Not a chesspiece, no snout or ears, but a soft edged, ill defined shark bite chunked out of the side of the nebulosity, leaving the black sky to spill into that cove and the nebulosity of IC 434 to curve around it. One side of where the dark intrusion started was marked with a very faint pair of stars which I believe I've read Swampthing / Steve describe as his indicator of the Horsehead location.
I kept observing for 20-30 minutes trying all the tricks I know to keep all stray light from around my eye and the eyepiece. The clarity of what I was seeing ebbed and flowed, possibly after a while because my eye was just trying so hard !. But the more I observed, the more confident I became that I was seeing this long sought target. Ok, it was very indistinct - well I'd thought it would be, especially if I ever managed to see it from my back yard, but I was pretty sure that I was looking at Barnard 33, at last !.
I rather reluctantly dragged myself away from the eyepiece and tried a couple of other eyepieces with the H-Beta filter attached - a 30mm plossl (Vixen) and the 17.3mm Delos. Each time I came back to the eyepiece I needed 10-15 minutes to get back "into the zone" again. But the same pattern of vague nebulosity was indeed replicated with the darkened bay pushing into the cloudy edge of IC 434 in the same place, to the same extent and at the same angle, each time. The original 24mm eyepiece seemed to provide the most distinct view but I should really say the least indistinct !. Not a spectacular view at all, just suble variations of dark and slightly darker patches of space peppered with stars. Without the filter the stars brightened but only the Flame and NGC 2023 were visible in terms of nebulosity. IC 434 and the large, dark, thumb shaped indentation were nowhere to be seen.
OK. Back inside to warm up (it's cold out there despite the adrenalin flow that the hunt has prompted). Take stock of what has been observed. I turn to one of my favourite web references on deep sky observing - Jeremy Perez and his wonderful "Belt of Venus" website. Here is what Jeremy says about his observations of this target, albeit with a smaller aperture scope than mine (from a darker sky though, I'll bet !):
http://www.perezmedia.net/beltofvenus/archives/000379.html
Re-reading the above has confirmed 100% for me that, tonight, I have seen the Horsehead Nebula
So much of what Jeremy describes chimes with my experiences and my impressions tonight
I got into astronomy 40+ years back with the help of Sir Patrick Moore's "The Observers Book of Astronomy" and in that little volume there is a greyscale long exposure image of the Horsehead Nebula which made a big impression on me then and has stuck with me to this day.
Quite possibly this is the least impressive target I've seen though a scope in all those years observing but the pleasure that seeing it at last has delivered is very tangible indeed.
If you have got this far, thanks for bearing with my rambling descriptions
