Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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January 8th just at dawn I photographed my first celestial event of the year. The Occultation of the crescent moon and Antares the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius.
The tiny dot of light on the Earthshine side of the crescent moon is Antares right before it slipped behind the Moon. Venus the morning star shines brightly above and to the left of the Moon.
I give you three views, one with my star filter on my lens, one with my ultra wide angle lens, and one deeply cropped to show Antares slipping behind the Moon.
Crescent Moon, Antares, Venus dawn January 8, 2024
Venus above and left of the Crescent Moon, Antares a tiny dot of light on the Earthshine side of the Crescent Moon just before it disappeared behind the Moon.
I was in a bit of a rush putting on my star filter so it went on askew so some of the star lines aren’t clean, and worse it’s now stuck. It’s on too tight for me to unscrew it, and I broke my filter wrench some time ago removing a ND (neutral density) filter, and failed to replace it. DOH! I have ordered a new one…and not a plastic one this time. It should arrive today.
We had our first big snow drop that stuck on Sat/Sun. It required shoveling. My neighbor bought a new cordless snow-blower and did our driveway twice! I just shoveled the clean up and the road below our driveway. She’s a jewel! She said it took just 12 minutes to do the driveway. We’ve made a deal. She’ll do the snow-blower and I do the clean up shoveling on 3 driveways and sidewalks. I told her I’d spring for the Hot Cocoa with marshmallows!
We have another big storm coming this weekend which is going to mess up my plans to meet friends, and do some birding at one of our favorite California refuges. It’s going to snow here, and in the mountains I’d need to cross, and it’s got rain on the forecast for there. It’s always a risk in the winter though isn’t it. Looks like I’ll be cancelling my plans.
Hopefully, we can meetup in February.
That’s me all caught up. How’s it going for you? Were any of you up and notice the tiny reddish star right beside the moon Monday morning?
Nikon D810| Nikkor 24-120mm & Nikkor 20mmG| PS CC 25.3.1
more to come…
Circadianreflections Blog 
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