M 44, also called Praesepe or Beehive, is one of the greatest Open
Clusters of the night sky. Consisting of many bright stars, it is
already visible with the naked eye, the best view, however, is provided
by binoculars or a rich field telescope, which show M 44 in all her
magnificent beauty. The 1.5° FOV the Newtonian provided, when I sketched
this, was already way to small to show all the stars belonging to this
great cluster.
Date: December 24, 2006
Location: Steinwald, Bavaria, Germany
Instrument: Vixen Newtonian 4.5″ f/6 on Vixen GP
Constellation: Cancer
Seeing: Antoniadi II
NELM: 6m0
Bortle: 5
Magnification: 45x
Sebastian Lehner
That is an excellent sketch of the Beehive Sebastian! M44 is definitely one of my favorite open clusters, and you have rendered it brilliantly!
Jason
Sebastian,
Very nice sketch of the Beehive cluster. It really fills your eyepiece and goes beyond at 45x. Excellent job.
Frank