The purpose of this feature is to give scout leaders, educators and naturalists an idea of some of the natural events coming up each month. We will try to cover a variety of natural events ranging from sky events to calling periods of amphibians, bird and mammal watching tips, prominent wildflowers and anything else that comes to mind. We will also note prominent constellations appearing over the eastern horizon at mid-evening each month for our area for those who would like to learn the constellations. If you have suggestions for other types of natural information you would like to see added to this calendar, let us know! Note: You can click on the hyperlinks to learn more about some of the featured items. To return to the Calendar, hit the "back" button on your browser, NOT the "back" button on the web page. All charts are available in a "printer friendly" mode, with black stars on a white background. Left clicking on each chart will take you to a printable black and white image. Please note that images on these pages are meant to be displayed at 100%. If your browser zooms into a higher magnification than that, the images may lose quality. Though we link book references to nationwide sources, we encourage you to support your local book store whenever possible.
Notes and Images From August 2018 Last month I moved to a rental house on the same property as my observatory on Lookout Mountain. The house has a large pond next to it and some large oaks and hickories in the yard. I took the photo below shortly after moving in.
There are three ponds on the property. On August 31st I found this Lesser Yellowlegs foraging around the edge of a pond near where my observatory will be located.
Black Bear have been seen and photographed on the property, so it should be an interesting habitat to explore.
Sky Events for September 2018: T he Sun reaches the September equinox on the 22nd at 9:54pm EDT. This marks the beginning of autumn in the Northern Hemisphere.Evening Sky: Jupiter is in Libra this month. Look for it about 26 degrees above the southwestern sky at dusk as the month begins. If you steady your binoculars on something solid, you can often pick out several of the four Galilean satellites of Jupiter close to the planet. With a telescope, you can glimpse some details in the cloud belts. These details change rapidly, and the details can look different from night to night. It's also fun to watch the Galilean satellites transit the face of the planet, or be eclipsed by the planet's shadow.
Venus drops a little closer to the western horizon this month, but is still brightening as it approaches Earth. It is now a waning crescent, getting thinner each day before it passes between the Earth and the Sun next month. Mercury remains visible in the morning sky for the first week of September. Look for it from 30 to 45 minutes before sunrise in the east. You will want a fairly flat eastern horizon, as it will be only about 8 degrees above the horizon.
Saturn is in Sagittarius this month. Look for it about 32 degrees above the Southern horizon at dusk. The tilt of the rings has now opened to 26 degrees, and the view is spectacular in any size telescope. The planet transits around 9:00pm EDT. The globe of Saturn is now 17.3 seconds of an arc in apparent diameter. Times given are in EDT for Chattanooga. Those in other time zones will need to adjust the given times accordingly.
Constellations: The views below show the sky looking east at 11:00pm EDT on September 15th. The first view shows the sky with the constellations outlined and names depicted. Star and planet names are in green. Constellation names are in blue. The second view shows the same scene without labels. New constellations this month are Pegasus, the Flying Horse, Andromeda, Princess Andromeda, Triangulum, the Triangle, Pisces, the Fishes, and Aquarius, the Water Bearer.High overhead, in Hercules, another globular cluster is at its best this month. Messier 13 can sometimes be picked out with the naked eye on a dark moonless night. It is about 25,000 light-years distant. In a small telescope it will appear like a little cotton ball of faint light. With increasing aperture, you'll be able to spot some of the faint stars around the periphery of the cluster. Be sure to use averted vision, looking to one side of the cluster, to allow the cluster's light to fall on the light-sensitive rod cells of your eye.
On Learning the Constellations: We advise learning a few constellations each month, and then following them through the seasons. Once you associate a particular constellation coming over the eastern horizon at a certain time of year, you may start thinking about it like an old friend, looking forward to its arrival each season. The stars in the evening scene above, for instance, will always be in the same place relative to the horizon at the same time and date each September. Of course, the planets do move slowly through the constellations, but with practice you will learn to identify them from their appearance. In particular, learn the brightest stars for they will guide you to the fainter stars. Once you can locate the more prominent constellations, you can "branch out" to other constellations around them. It may take you a little while to get a sense of scale, to translate what you see on the computer screen or what you see on the page of a book to what you see in the sky. Look for patterns, like the stars that make up the "Square of Pegasus." The earth's rotation causes the constellations to appear to move across the sky just as the sun and the moon appear to do. If you go outside earlier than the time shown on the charts, the constellations will be lower to the eastern horizon. If you observe later, they will have climbed higher. As each season progresses, the earth's motion around the sun causes the constellations to appear a little farther towards the west each night for any given time of night.Recommended: Sky & Telescope's Pocket Star Atlas is beautiful, compact star atlas. A good book to learn the constellations is Patterns in the Sky, by Hewitt-White. You may also want to check out at H. A. Rey's classic, The Stars, A New Way to See Them. For sky watching tips, an inexpensive good guide is Secrets of Stargazing, by Becky Ramotowski.
A good general reference book on astronomy is the Peterson
Field Guide,
A Field Guide to the Stars and Planets, by Pasachoff. The book retails for around $14.00.
The Virtual Moon Atlas is a terrific way to learn the surface features of the Moon. And it's free software. You can download the Virtual Moon Atlas here. Apps: We really love the Sky Safari 6 Pro. It is available for both iOS and Android operating systems. There are three versions. The Pro is simply the best astronomy app we've ever seen. The description of the Pro version reads, "includes over 100 million stars, 3 million galaxies down to 18th magnitude, and 750,000 solar system objects; including every comet and asteroid ever discovered." A nother great app is the Photographer's Ephemeris. Great for finding sunrise, moonrise, sunset and moonset times and the precise place on the horizon that the event will occur. Invaluable not only for planning photographs, but also nice to plan an outing to watch the full moon rise. Available for both androids and iOS.
Amphibians:
Frog and toad choruses start waning in September but some frogs and toads
are still calling. As
mentioned above, a
Southern Leopard Frog and a
Cope's Gray Treefrog began
calling during the total phase of the solar eclipse.
Spring Peepers
are also know as "Autumn Pipers" and can be heard calling from patches of
woods during the fall. Listen also for the very dry and scratchy
version of the Upland Chorus Frog's song on rainy fall evenings. Recommended: The Frogs and Toads of North America, Lang Elliott, Houghton Mifflin Co.
Archives (Remember to use the back button on your browser, NOT the back button on the web page!) Natural Calendar February 2018 Natural Calendar December 2017 Natural Calendar November 2017 Natural Calendar October 2017Natural Calendar September 2017 Natural Calendar February 2017 Natural Calendar December 2016 Natural Calendar November 2016 Natural Calendar September 2016Natural Calendar February 2016 Natural Calendar December 2015 Natural Calendar November 2015 Natural Calendar September 2015 Natural Calendar November 2014 Natural Calendar September 2014 Natural Calendar September 2013 Natural Calendar December 2012 Natural Calendar November 2012 Natural Calendar September 2012 Natural Calendar February 2012 Natural Calendar December 2011 Natural Calendar November 2011 Natural Calendar September 2011 Natural Calendar December 2010 Natural Calendar November 2010 Natural Calendar September 2010 Natural Calendar February 2010 Natural Calendar December 2009 Natural Calendar November 2009 Natural Calendar September 2009 Natural Calendar February 2009 Natural Calendar December 2008 Natural Calendar November 2008 Natural Calendar September 2008 Natural Calendar February 2008 Natural Calendar December 2007 Natural Calendar November 2007 Natural Calendar September 2007 Natural Calendar February 2007 Natural Calendar December 2006 Natural Calendar November 2006 Natural Calendar September 2006 Natural Calendar February 2006
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Natural Calendar November 2003 Natural Calendar February 2003 Natural Calendar December 2002 Natural Calendar November 2002 Nature Notes Archives: Nature Notes was a page we published in 2001 and 2002 containing our observations about everything from the northern lights display of November 2001 to frog and salamander egg masses. Night scenes prepared with The Sky Professional from Software Bisque All images and recordings © 2018 Leaps
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