Orion the Hunter

Last week I did another 3-in-the-morning stint of star-gazing. I was pleased that I got some pictures of Orion. Online I discovered some interesting things about it.

These are the main stars that make up Orion. The two angled stars at the top make up his shoulders with a faint head in between and above. The two bottom angled stars make up his feet. The three sideways, angled stars are his belt, and further below in some of the pictures you can see three stars that make up his sword. Double-click to see better.

Here are the names of some of the stars:

Rigel at the bottom is the brightest star and is the 6th brightest star in the sky. It is the left foot of Orion (think of him as facing you).
Betelguese at the top left is a massive red supergiant star nearing the end of its life. When it explodes it will even be visible during the day. It is the right shoulder of Orion and is the 8th brightest star in the sky.
Bellatrix is the other shoulder and is the 22nd brightest star.
Saiph is Orion's right foot and is a similar size and strength as Rigel but appears much fainter since its light is mostly emitted in the ultraviolet region of the spectrum which the human eye cannot see.
Meissa forms Orion's head.

Looking for Orion's belt is the easiest way to find Orion in the sky. It is most visible in January around 9 p.m. and is not visible in the summer.

Alnitak, the eastern (left) star in the belt is 100,000 time brighter than the sun and is 800 light years away. It is actually a triple star.

Alnilam is the centre star in the belt and is nearly twice as far from the sun as the other two but its luminosity makes it nearly equal in magnitude. It is 1340 light years away and is 375,000 times more luminous than the sun.

Mintaka is the westernmost star in the belt and is a double star; the two orbit each other every 5.73 days. It is 915 light years away and is 90,000 times more luminous than the sun.

The sword of Orion are multiple stars called the Orion Nebula and the Trapezium. Using binoculars you can see its clouds of stars, luminous gas and dust.

This is betelguese, the top left shoulder. (Mal calls it beetle-juice!) If you look closely it does appear more orangeish than the other stars because it is nearing the end of its life. A white or blue star is hotter than an orange or red star which is dying.

Colored Stars

For several months I've been noticing this extra-bright star in the sky and wondering what it is. After reading an article in our local paper I realized it must be Jupiter, which is visible until March. It is the third brightest object in the night sky, after the moon and Venus. It can be seen in the south, going from east to west, following the same path as the sun takes during the day. It won't come as close to earth again until 2022.

This is Jupiter close up; you can see its bluish tinge. After taking pictures I noticed that they showed different colors of stars and I wondered if that was just the photography, because I couldn't see colors when looking at the stars.

So I checked out Mr. Google and discovered that stars do indeed have colors according to their temperature. Blue, blue-white and white are the hottest stars and yellow, orange and red are the coolest. Blue is about 25x hotter than red.

This picture shows some of the different colors. You may need to double-click on it to see them better.

And it is true that our eyes do not perceive the colors when we look at the night sky. The reasons vary and are somewhat technical, but a simplistic reason would be that we do not see color at night. At night our pupils dilate to let dim light in and the resulting large aperture degrades image quality. Our eyes take about half an hour at night to reach maximum sensitivity.

In this picture I've increased the saturation to see the color better.

Taking pictures of the night sky is a challenge I'm still working on. If you photograph on an automatic setting the stars won't show. If you keep the shutter open too long, the stars will have tails because of their movement. After reading up a bit and experimenting I discovered that you have to focus manually and I increased the ISO to 1600 in these pictures.

I took these pictures at 4 a.m.! I wouldn't be doing that if it was -30! We've had such beautiful weather and it was relatively warm, although when I went back to bed it took me a long time to warm up! Even though it's dark in the evening the stars don't show up brightly until the middle of the night. Especially in town.

Now I'd like to get a beginner's book on stars so I can identify more!

Christmas 2011

Merry Christmas!
Jess and Darrell made us a new sign and clock combo which we have put up in our entryway.

Jon and Magan hosted the Christmas celebration on Boxing Day.

Darrell and Jess made a fast trip for the Boxing Day celebration and Tim and Juanita were able to come to our place and stay a bit longer.

Mal made a car game for Kaleb and Jack and they seemed to enjoy playing it.

This picture of a sparrow in the snow was taken earlier in the month. By christmas Day it was so warm that we didn't have a lot of snow left. Overall, December was unseasonably warm, which thankfully made for great travelling conditions.

Winter Garden

There is a certain beauty about a garden after the snow has come.
This is our hydrangea.

Cranberry shrub.

A weed that never got pulled!

A raspberry that nbever got picked!

Climatis.

Ladybugs and Such

I got up at 6:30 this morning and noticed there was a pretty dramatic sunrise, so I put some sweat pants and a jacket over my pyjamas, grabbed my camera and rushed out to take some pictures. It was amazingly beautiful and warm, so I stayed out for about half an hour just taking pictures. Great start to the day!

A month ago the air was thick with aphids and they were devouring our plants. I guess the ladybugs prospered with all that food and now we have ladybugs all over. My sunflowers, our trees, the ground and even the deck are loaded with them. I've tried to catch a picture of one flying so I can see what they look like up close when they fly. They look like it would be impossible for them to fly - even more so than a bumble bee. I did get one picture of a flying ladybug, but not clear enough to enlighten me.

This one flew away just a milli-second after I snapped. I could see he was getting ready to go with a wing stuck out behind him, but I missed the take-off.

This butterfly is called Mourning Cloak. It was enjoying our apple tree when I snapped him.

Mal is pretty pleased with the size of his green peppers. We have them up against the south side of our house where they get lots of sun. We're eating his tomatoes, peppers, onions, beans, and peas now. Yum!

Canoeing Adventure

We were camping with Rob and Linda when Mal and Rob decided to canoe down the Little Red River.

A mother Merganser and her brood led the way for about an hour of the trip. The mother is at the back with the bright orange bill. There were 9 young, and they will also develop orange bills.

When they got close, the birds would run ahead. Mergansers typically run along the surface of the water to gain speed until they can take off in flight.

The Little Red had flooded earlier in the summer and banks washed away, leaving trees and debris in the water. This made the trip quite a challenge! They had only gone a short distance when they came across the first tree trunk, and tipped the canoe trying to get around it. This was the first of several soakings! In other places the river was very shallow and they had to get out and walk down the river. All in all, there were continual challenges!
Meanwhile Linda and I drove to a Saskatoon Berry Farm and bought some great pies. Then we went to the bank of the river to await our returning heroes!

They arrived, very tired and soaking wet! Mal went off in the vain search for a hot shower, and Rob comforted himself with some hot chocolate.

Now comes the best part of the adventure: "Remember that trip we took down Little Red...!"

Marlene's Surprise Birthday Celebration

Ron and Marlene happened to be here on her birthday,
so it was a good chance to plan a surprise!

She knew we were taking them out of dinner, but she had no idea sister Irene had come back from B.C. with us, or that Kristen and Keith and these good friends would also be joining us.

Irene and I decided an appropriate theme for the celebration would be BLING!

"BLING! BLING!
Marlene loves BLING!
These sparkly gifts will make her sing..."

Marlene and her BLING!

The cake.

(I didn't tell them which birthday it was, honest, Mars!!!)