Heads up ! Starcount !

[Davey-T]

23 minutes ago, carastro said:

Well from my lovely Bortle 8 location, I counted the 3 in the belt only with occasional blinks from one in the sword so that makes 4.

I used to be able to see M42 fizz from here, but that's long gone.  Even the M45 I struggle to identify these days.  I wonder whether it is the LED lighting that was installed 2 or 3 years ago.  

Carole 

Likewise, I can only make out the main stars in any constellation from here and the Pleiades is just a blur but that could just be my eyesight 

Dave

[cotterless45]

Some superb informative posts here and surprising results .

At 8.30 I managed by recounting 9 stars excluding the frame stars. Only one was above the belt. Our southern sky is over town and bright. West of that are the arc lights of the golf driving range. I shall be putting that in the comments section.

Some nights have been better in the early hours ,with a complete Orion bow on view.

It might be a flawed survey , comparable to the back garden bird survey. But it does give CPRE a rough idea . In addition it might have got folks outside, although I thought the advice given on the BBC to sit in the garden until your eyes adapted was more an SAS trial than enjoying the sky !

Nick.

[Demonperformer]

14 hours ago, Mark at Beaufort said:

I have already set up the 12" Dob for tonight so I will also count the stars in Orion. I think I will wear my observing hood and sit back in a reclining chair and see how many stars I can count. I will  first undertake a transparency assessment using the attached guidelines and if its 6 I will submit my results.

Well, that puts me at about 3 on a good night. Which, by a staggering coincidence, is also the number of stars I can see within the rectangle of Orion (no prizes for guessing which stars they are!)

[Demonperformer]

14 hours ago, Mark at Beaufort said:

I have already set up the 12" Dob for tonight so I will also count the stars in Orion. I think I will wear my observing hood and sit back in a reclining chair and see how many stars I can count. I will  first undertake a transparency assessment using the attached guidelines and if its 6 I will submit my results.

Well, that puts me at about 3 on a good night. Which, by a staggering coincidence, is also the number of stars I can see within the rectangle of Orion (no prizes for guessing which stars they are!)

[wookie1965]

I could see the 10 main stars and 5 on the outskirts 2 being in the bow. My son said he could see 21 with a few near the sword and above the belt stars.

[John]

I counted the "sword" as 3 stars in the end. It was probably actually 3 star groups of course. I think 53 Orionis was the faintest that I could consistently see. The transparency went downhill fast here after midnight so by the time I packed my scope in my count would have been less than 10 if I'd done it then. Glad I did it earlier !

As Nick says, it's a slightly flawed process but it should raise awareness and may get people out under the stars looking up and wondering about what they are looking at, which has to be good

[DaveS]

10 hours ago, geoflewis said:

I'm sure. When I was about 10 years old (that's some 55 years ago), living in North Norfolk, I recall that my best effort was counting 17 naked eye stars in the Pleiades - now I'm luck to count 7...!! The skies are nowhere as pristine and my eyes are even worse, especially having to look through my specs....!!

When I was in my late teens / early twenties I could see 12-14 stars in the Pleiades, from Acton in West London. Now I can only see a few from Dorset. Can't split Mizar and Alcor either .

On Mark's scale I was 6-7.

[Mark at Beaufort]

31 minutes ago, DaveS said:

On Mark's scale I was 6-7.

To give it credit its the Astronomical League's Observing Programme based in the United States. They also produce a similar document on 'seeing'.

[Jkulin]

16 hours ago, geoflewis said:

As I understand it you DO NOT include the 4 corner stars, clockwise Belelgeuse, Belatrix, Rigel and Saiph. This is from the BAA website...

Hope this helps.

Geof

Yep spot on Geof, also I think it is meant to be with the naked eye, not via a scope.

[Cyclops]

With my eyesight I could only count the most obvious ones! My eyesight is bad enough (myopia) but it gets worse at night as the pupils dilate.

[geoflewis]

2 hours ago, Jkulin said:

Yep spot on Geof, also I think it is meant to be with the naked eye, not view a scope.

Absolutely, though I think it's ok to confirm very faint stars with binos, just to be sure that your eyes aren't deceiving you.

Geof

[F15Rules]

On 02/02/2019 at 20:58, John said:

 

I was near York at the weekend (about 7 miles from the centre). Skies weren't too bad at all, although LP from York was evident to the south west of Orion.

After about 10 minutes of night vision adaptation I managed 17 or 18 stars. My daughter's mother in law who was also outside could only get about 6 or 7 stars even though she is younger than me. 

I taught her the averted vision trick and she did eventually see a few more. But I do think that experienced stargazers will see significantly more faint stars than newbies or casual viewers.

My co-viewer did also learn how to use Orion's belt to find the Hyades and Pleiades too, also Sirius, and I also showed her The Plough, Polaris and Cassiopeia, which she seemed genuinely chuffed to bits with. 

She also spotted that Betelgeuse looked a different colour to the rest, without prompting☺.

I think I could catch more stars from home on a good night, so will try again this week, skies permitting, and submit my findings?

Dave

[Gina]

No stars to see here - it's raining - but that will clear away the snow so it's actually good!

[Demonperformer]

5 hours ago, F15Rules said:

I taught her the averted vision trick and she did eventually see a few more.

That is an aspect that I had not even considered. I may be able to see more that way, but is that really what this survey wants? Won't using av skew the results? Worse still, won't it encourage people to think the LP we all have to put up with is not so bad after all?

[F15Rules]

6 hours ago, Demonperformer said:

That is an aspect that I had not even considered. I may be able to see more that way, but is that really what this survey wants? Won't using av skew the results? Worse still, won't it encourage people to think the LP we all have to put up with is not so bad after all?

It's a fair point, but many of the stars we see in a darkish sky are first "perceived" using averted vision, whether consciously or not.

The issue with light pollution, I think, is that most light pollution will drown out fainter stars completely, averted vision or not. In less LP affected skies, averted vision is a good technique to simply notice stars which are on the edge of visibility. - often prompting us to go back and look again - "did I really see that star"?"

I link a more likely "risk" to the survey results is that a high percentage of the respondents are likely to be existing Astro amateurs, most whom will use averted vision whether consciously or not?

If you are unlucky enough to suffer heavy local light pollution, then averted vision isn't likely to help you at all I'm afraid.

Dave

[Cjg]

The lower the count, the better, shows that we need to be careful about new street lighting etc?

Chris

[martin_h]

It doesn't take long here......... 3

[devdusty]

I can only see the seven main stars of Orion from my light polluted back garden.  I see no point in buying a telescope if your skies are Bortle 8

 

Chris P

[Mognet]

Best I've managed from home recently is six, even after the local streetlights have gone out. I'm blaming the Southend to Basildon corridor for that

[SteveNickolls]

On 02/02/2019 at 18:37, JamesF said:

I'd bet my teenage children would count more stars than I can see.

Quite agree, when I made the count on Saturday night I could see only 8 stars but my son who is in his early 30's could count 17 (that's not including the framing stars btw). Converting the readings off my new SQM-L meter showed the VLM at that time was just over Mag 5. We submitted both reports to the CPRE.

 Cheers,
Steve

[John]

I included E & F Trapezium which I can now see naked eye with my new Takahashi contact lenses

[avtaram]

1 hour ago, devdusty said:

I see no point in buying a telescope if your skies are Bortle 8

 

Chris P

I have Bortle 8 skies but there is still plenty to see.

Double and multiple stars, open clusters, globular clusters, planets, the moon, asterisms.

Enough to keep one busy for a lifetime.?

Avtar

[carastro]

Quote

I see no point in buying a telescope if your skies are Bortle 8

I agree with Avtar.  I cut my teeth on imaging from Bortle 8 and although I am limited in what I can do from here, I can do a certain amount of narrowband.  I do however have to travel to a dark location to get the rest.

This is my new website that features ONLY stuff I have imaged from Bortle 8.  

https://sites.google.com/view/carastroimaging/home

Carole 

[LeeRich]

3 minutes ago, carastro said:

https://sites.google.com/view/carastroimaging/home

? outstanding !!! Simply outstanding. Kudos ✊?

[Demonperformer]

Yes, very encouraging, Carole.