Saturn Notes - 9 April 2010

[DarkerSky]

Having a tea break after watching Saturn for the last half hour.

The North Equatorial Band and North Polar Region in general look different to a few nights ago. There is much more of an equalling out in the intensity of shading between them.

On 4 April when I was last on the planet (and before on 27 march) the NPR was very weakly shaded. On 4th Apr it was actually appearing quite light. Tonight it is much more evenly shaded right up to the boundary with the NEB, which looks less obvious (weaker shading). Could be a general difference in the intensity of both, or could be just a difference in one of them against the other giving less of a contrast effect.

Interesting !

[Doc]

I love looking at Saturn as their is just so much to look at. I know you keep records so in your wonderful 16" how many moons have you seen. I've seen all 8 and believe me it was awesome.

I always find the NPR always stands out alot more then the NEB's do.

[DarkerSky]

I've seen 6 moons so far on 3 different occasions. I've not yet observed at a time when 8 are in the same FOV.

Went out for a further hour after my posting. Came to the conclusion that all the markings in the southern hemisphere were darker / more distinct than in the north.

I think it is fascinating that subtle changes are going on. I notice on one of the Saturn imaging threads that someone picked up a white spot / storm in the south a couple of nights ago.

Going to have to get to grips with saturn longitudes to work out when it might be visible! If it persists that is