My first Magazine Sky & Telescope - 03.2019 | Page 34

Herschel Catalog
Tackling the Observing
I purchased a used 16-inch f/4.5 Meade reflector in 1987. In
1998 the AAAP replaced the 20-inch mirror on the Manka
Memorial Telescope at Wagman Observatory with a 21-inch
f/4.75 mirror donated by L3 Brashear. The performance of
these larger scopes was improved when both the 16- and
21-inch were resurfaced to 98% reflectivity several years ago.
q FORTY-TWO YEARS, SIX MONTHS, AND 20 NIGHTS Tom Reiland
bagged his last Herschel source, NGC 5592 (below, far right), in 2017. He
estimates he’s recorded more than 153,000 observations (amounting to
5,665 hours) on several thousand pages in 15 logbooks since 1974. The
fi rst source he observed was the Double Cluster in Perseus (below), and
his most successful night pursuing the AL 400 was in 1979.
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M A RCH 2 019 • SK Y & TELESCOPE
You have to be obsessed,
crazy, or both to attempt this.
I feel I was both.
This helped with my search for faint to very faint deep-sky
objects. However, there’s one problem with larger scopes that
we often forget: They may gather more light, but that light
can include glow from homes and street lights. This light pol-
lution reduces the darkness of the background when trying to
spot faint, diffuse objects in suburban and even some rural
areas. In addition to these larger scopes, I also used a 3-inch
f/10, a 6-inch f/6.6, and an 8-inch f/5, with magnifi cations
ranging from 31× to 508×. All were Newtonians.
All of my observing is done via star-hopping. I wouldn’t
consider using a Go To system, as I personally feel no sense
of accomplishment using a computer to move my scopes to
the objects on my search lists. Also, I wonder whether the
Go To systems include the “nonexistent” objects listed in the
catalogs. I didn’t use setting circles, either, but that doesn’t
mean you shouldn’t support your search with either of these.
Herschel “swept” the sky — he’d study the sky for an hour or
more with a telescope aimed at the meridian mounted on a
transit circle, pausing only if clouds interfered or if he had
to reset his telescope — to acquire each object for his catalog
without any extra aid, and I feel that star-hopping is the clos-
est that I can get to following his sweeping system.
Omitting duplicated Messier objects in Herschel’s catalogs,
I observed my fi rst Herschel object — or should I say objects —
on the night of October 6, 1974, with a 3-inch f/10 Newto-
nian at 45×. They were NGC 869 and NGC 884, the Double
Cluster in Perseus. I completed the Herschel 400 in 1981
and received the certifi cate in June that year. I never thought
about observing all 2,500+ deep-sky objects identifi ed by
Herschel at that time or even after I fi nished a second set of
400 objects 25 years later. And yet, 42 years, 6 months, and
20 nights later I bagged the last one, NGC 5592 in Hydra,
on the night of April 26, 2017, at the Amateur Astronomers
Association of Pittsburgh’s (AAAP) observing site in Greene
County, Pennsylvania, using my 16-inch f/4.5 Dobsonian.
The question many of us have been asking for years is,
“How many observable objects are there in Herschel’s catalog?”