VOL. 70, N 8 • August 2006 • $2 · the Swan, where 2005 Boeing Science Writing Contest winner Bernie Taylor asks us whether geese could inhabitat a planet almost like—but not

VOL. 70, No 8 • August 2006 • $250

PAGE 2 AUGUST 2006G R I F F I T H O B S E R V E R

Are There Geese on Cygnus 3?Bernie Taylor

Newberg, Oregon

HONORABLE MENTIONBOEING GRIFFITH OBSERVER

SCIENCE WRITING CONTEST 2005

If there were geese anywhere in the universe besides earth, we should probably expect to find them in the constellation Vulpecula. Vulpecula the Fox was contrived by Johannes Hevelius, the famous Polish astronomer who was based in Gdansk in the seventeenth century. Hevelius

originally named this constellation Vulpecula & Anser, or the Fox & Goose. It’s no longer possible, however, to take a gander at the Goose. The Goose is long gone, ingested by the Fox in whose jaws Hevelius mapped its neck. Vulpecula is located right next to Cygnus the Swan, and for this 2005 Boeing Science Writing Contest article, Bernie Taylor has allowed those extraterrestrial geese to migrate to an imagined planet in the Swan, Cygnus 3.

Bernie Taylor is a quantitatively-minded naturalist living in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. His 2004 book, Biological Time, examines the rhythms that regulate the lives of animals and plants and documents as well as ancient and indigenous knowledge of these natural cycles.

Some of these biological rhythms are modulated by celestial phenomena, and so Mr. Taylor asks whether different astronomical circumstances would alter the behavior of geese on another world or even eliminate the possibility of their existence. His imaginary planet in some ways parallels the earth. It is the third planet from its sun, a solar-like star in Cygnus. Notwithstanding the similarity of Cygnus 3 to earth, looking for geese on that planet could be a wild-goose chase.

The ancients imagined the constellation Cygnus as a swan in flight, headed south. They linked its seasonal departure from the night sky to the autumn migration of water fowl. Our failure to find any geese on Cygnus 3 wouldn/t necessarily mean they don’t exist. They could, after all, have just gone south on us. What’s good for the Goose is sauce for the Swan. —E.C.K.

FRONT COVERGoing Where the Wild Goose Goes

In 1950, Frankie Laine topped the record chart with “Cry of the Wild Goose.” According to the second verse, he “heard the wild goose cry, Wingin’ north in the lonely sky.” This month wild geese are wingin’ north into Cygnus the Swan, where 2005 Boeing Science Writing Contest winner Bernie Taylor asks us whether geese could inhabitat a planet almost like—but not exactly like—earth. (Cygnus woodcut image from Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia, by Johannes Hevelius, 1687; celestial photograph by Anthony Cook, Griffith Observatory; illustration David Allen, Griffith Observatory)

AUGUST 2006 PAGE 3G R I F F I T H O B S E R V E R

Are there geese on Cygnus 3? Will golfers on this imaginary planet have to watch their

step and airstrip crews there clear the runways before flight? Should the Humane Society counsel us in the rules of engagement? I suggest that we not need worry ourselves with this threat, as we have on earth, for there are no geese at present on this distant world. This situation might seem surprising at first sight. Cygnus 3 is a good, blue-water planet that looks much like ours. The terrain and atmosphere are comparable. Cygnus 3’s relative position to its sun is almost equidistant to ours from our sun so that the lengths of the days and seasons on the two planets are the same. This remote body even has one moon of comparable size. But Cygnus 3 is older than earth, and its moon orbits farther away. Instead of our 29.5-day lunar cycle of light and darkness, the period from one waxing crescent moon to another is 60 days. If there were Cygnians, which has yet to be determined, their solar year would be the same length as ours. They would, however, divide the year into approximately six lunar months, instead of something between 12 and 13 as we do.

This last point may be the key to establishing definitively the absence of geese on Cygnus 3. This concept is also congruent with the philosophy of the French natural historian Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707-1788) who

wrote that “in order to judge what has happened, or even what will happen, one need only examine what is happening… Events which occur every

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Ornithology, the scientific and systematic study of birds, was in part established by Comte Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon, who wrote ten volumes of his Natural History of Birds. Buffon emphasized the fundamental importance of cyclically repetitive events in establishing behavioral rhythms. (from The Birds (Life Nature Library), by Roger Tory Peterson and the Editors of Time-Life Books, New York: Time-Life Books, 1963)


The Canada goose, one of the most familiar migrating waterbirds of North America, relies on the production of melatonin for behavioral signals. Melatonin production, triggered by darkness, occurs at night and is suspended during the day. (from Birds (Golden Nature Guide), by Herbert S. Zim and Ira N. Gabrielson, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1949)


In the Galapagos Islands, full moons coincide with lower melatonin production in the Nazca boobie, a seabird related to the gannets. Melatonin levels help govern the bird’s behavior. (photograph Brenda Levin)


day, movements which succeed each other and repeat themselves without interruption, constant and constantly reiterated operations; those are our causes and our reasons1. Because the most constant rhythms which all plants and animals experience are those of the sun and moon, it would be reasonable to conclude a difference in the timing of a lunation might also affect the geese. Therefore, as a start, we should look to how these forces might influence this animal.

Geese, like many animals, are modulated by the rhythms of the night. In the darkness, they synthesize a hormone called melatonin from their pineal body, the “master clock in the endocrine system.” Light, from the sun or any other source puts the breaks on melatonin production. Melatonin levels cue the geese to when they should rest, be active, or migrate, behavior which structures time and place for geese.

A team of biologists demonstrated this physio-chemical phenomenon for birds with tropical Nazca boobies (Sula granti) on Darwin’s playground, the Galapagos Islands off the Pacific coast of South America2. They found this bird, under free-living conditions, had lower melatonin levels around the

full moon than during the darker nights of the lunar cycle. This is very important work because only biological rhythm studies in a natural environment can tell us the full story for any plant or animal. Nevertheless, the field research closely follows what scientists have been observing for a wide range of animals subject to light and dark cycles in controlled laboratory experiments3.

We are like the geese. Anyone who has spent a few days in Alaska during the summer has found that the sun keeps us up during the arctic nights. This is a physio-chemical response. We also produce melatonin in the darkness. This hormone is what puts us to sleep, but when our environment is illuminated, melatonin levels are drastically reduced. That keeps us awake. With Alaska’s summer light continuing into the nights, we produce less melatonin and thereby stay awake longer. In contrast, the long, dark winter nights in

Lunar Phase Daynew 0waxing crescent 1 – 6first quarter 7waxing gibbous 8 – 13full moon 14 – 15waning gibbous 16 – 21last quarter 22waning crescent 23 – 28new moon 29

Conventional numbering of the moon’s phases starts the lunar cycle with new moon on day 0.

During spring courting, the male ruffed grouse of North America’s northern deep woods energetically beats its wings. The drumming, a territorial asssertion that attracts the female, crests at the time of full moon. (from Birds (Golden Nature Guide), by Herbert S. Zim and Ira N. Gabrielson, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1949)


Alaska bring on depression from increased levels of melatonin. Some of us migrate south to Florida or Arizona to feel better in the glow of the sun. The geese may avoid the disturbance to equilibrium by flying south for the winter to where the nights are shorter and melatonin levels are reduced. The food at the end of their journey is an advantage of flying south and not a cue to migrate.

The work from the Galapagos Islands is not unique. The peak drumming periods for the day-active ruffed grouse (Bonasa umbellus), for example, coincide with full moons during the breeding season, in April and May4. This bird’s drumming behavior is part of its courtship. The estimated copulation dates coincide with the second peak in drumming. In

contrast, the nocturnal spotted owl (Strix occidentalis Xantus) calls more frequently during the darker nights of the moon than the brighter nights5.

Other avian researchers have observed behavioral connections to the presence or absence of moonlight. A lunar migration cue was established in a study on the nocturnal migration of land birds at Southeast Farallon Island, California. Here it was found that diminished moonlight, in the fall, prompts an increased percentage of departures and presumably, a larger volume of migration over the region6. Increased levels of melatonin likely induce the migrations of these birds as well.

Ornithologists studying the Moluccan megapode (Megapodius wallacei), in Indonesia, noted behavior

Lesser snow geese have a strong propensity to hatch during the dark nights of the lunar cycle, between days 21 (last quarter) to 6 (first quarter). The Cree Indians of Saskatchewan call the lunar cycle in which they hatch pâskâwihowipîsim, the “egg-hatching moon,” and it is the sixth lunar month in the Cree calendar. The data tabulated here strongly indicate that hatching occurring between lunar days 21 and 6 was not random (p-value=.0172 from a chi-square test of goodness of fit).

YearMean

Date of Hatching

Lunar Day of Hatching

Dark or Light Lunar Day(1 = light/ 2=dark)

1973 June 24.3 23 21974 June 26.5 6 21975 June 22.2 12 11976 June 19.2 21 21977 June 15.0 28 21978 July 1.3 25 21979 June 26.8 1 21980 June 14.2 1 21981 June 24.1 21 21982 June 18.0 26 21983 July 6.8 25 21984 June 25.4 25 21985 June 19.8 0 21986 June 20.3 12 11987 June 26.0 0 21988 June 25.7 10 11989 June 27.8 23 21990 June 23.6 0 21991 June 19.5 6 21992 June 29.1 28 2


The most-frequent hatching dates for lesser snow geese fall during the two-week span of least moonlight. These mean hatching days are probably cued by earlier behavior and events that were timed by the sun and the moon. Accordingly, subsequent lunar days for significant gosling behavior systematically follow the hatching dates. (illustration Bernie Taylor)

Mean Lunar Day of Lesser Snow Geese La Perouse Bay, Manitoba, Canada

(1973-1992)

Percent

100

80

60

40

20

00 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 0

Lunar CycleNew Moon Full Moon New Moon

Year Easter Day1995 April 16

1996 April 7

1997 March 30

1998 April 12

1999 April 4

2000 April 23

2001 April 15

2002 March 31

2003 April 20

2004 April 11

2005 March 27

2006 April 16

According to the simplest rule, Easter usually occurs on the first Sunday following the full moon after the vernal equinox. Because the tropical seasonal year of 365.24 days does not contain a whole number of 29.5-day cycles of the moon’s phases, the calendar date of Easter is not the same from one year to the next. Natural events in the lives of animals that are cued by the sun and the moon also shift, for the same reason, from one year to the next.


synchronomous with the moon when they nested7. This bird, which nests on the islands of Haruku and Halmahera, buries its eggs deep in the sand of sun-exposed beaches and abandons them. They are incubated by the sun, and they hatch unattended. Villagers, who harvest the eggs for food, have long asserted that megapode activity varies with the phase of the moon. In support of the islanders’ belief, researchers following the harvesters found that the number of eggs is greatest between full moon and new moon. Scientists also observed that more Moluccan megapodes visited the nesting grounds on bright nights than during the new moon, when there is no moon. On moonlit nights, the birds also excavate burrows in communal groups and spend a longer time at the nesting ground digging deeper burrows. The researchers suggest there is a benefit to this timing strategy. A digging adult bird can see approaching lizards and pythons, neither of which needs light to hunt.

The idea that biological events may be by the moon’s cycle is not new. In fact, gauging the habits of plants and animals by the rhythms of the sun and moon may be as old as we are. This power of observation may have helped us succeed over other human species. We find remnants of this practice among Paleo-Indians. The calendars of the Cree Nation in Canada, for example, revolve around the movements of waterfowl and the responses of plants and are timed by the cycles of the moon. These astrobiologists are not alone, for the Cheyenne, Kiowa, Omaha, and Sioux similarly gauge the events of waterfowl by the moon. Ducks and geese are an important source of protein for the Cree, and knowing when major events of these birds occur, including migratory arrivals and departures and egg-laying, was critical to their survival.

The moon logically explains the cueing of migration and other events. The light from the moon is predictable and affects many regions at the same time. This can help ensure the birds arrive in nesting areas together. These birds do not have the ability to reason, yet they migrate for thousands of miles synchronously with their kin. There are not many ways to achieve this once you remove conscious decision making from the equation.

This question of lunar timing for waterfowl can be quantitatively demonstrated by a bird with which the Cree are familiar—the lesser snow goose (Anser caerulescens caerulscens). Now that we are again talking geese, we should also determine whether or not there are geese on Cygnus 3. Fieldwork on lesser

snow geese, coordinated since 1968 by the Canadian Wildlife Service in the harsh weather of northern Manitoba, Canada, support this hypothesis. The study confirmed there is low repeatability and heritability of egg-laying dates. This suggests that most of the differences in timing are due to non-genetic factors. Quantifiable reasons for the variability were not presented in published research, but a possible answer if offered by soli-lunar timing.

A match of the geese’s mean hatching dates (which generally occur from the middle of June to early July) to the lunar cycle reveals a connection. In 17 out of 20 years, the hatching occurred between lunar days 21 and 68. The lunation in which this interval between last quarter and first quarter moon occurs is the sixth month in the traditional Cree calendar (pâskâwihowipîsim - the egg-hatching moon). The data present strong evidence to indicate that the mean date of the hatchings is not random (p-value = .0172 from a chi-square goodness-of-fit test). This means hatching preferentially occurs on night with less moonlight.

It seems most likely the young lesser snow geese hatch from eggs when there is the least amount of moonlight. In the subarctic, however, the nights in June are not as dark as they are farther south. In more southern regions, goslings that hatch early or late (under the lighter nights) might be at the mercy of predators. Just as important, the goose parents needed to be habituated to longer-term solar and lunar cycles to time the hatchling consistently to this period. The geese must have migrated from the south (where there is no direct nighttime illumination from the sun), arrived, built their nests, copulated, and laid the eggs. Therefore, this relationship of hatching around the darkest nights likely fits into a continuum of other events timed by the sun and moon. Moreover, the hatching of the goslings around new moon will keep them in this continuum as they grow, mature, and later migrate.

We can follow this timing backwards. Because the incubation period for goose eggs is roughly 30 days, egg-laying occurred, at more southern latitudes, during a similar dark period. Copulation would have thereby occurred between full moon and new moon, and the courtship and nest-building would have coincided with full moon, when the Mollucan megapodes congregate. The timing of the gosling hatch under the dark nights, as set by the incubation period and the earlier activity of the parents, all help protect the defenseless birds from predators.

The lesser goose’s incubation period is longer than


the incubation period of the much smaller eastern bluebird (Sialia sialis), about two weeks, and shorter than the incubation period of the ostrich (Struthio camelus, about 42 days. In general, the larger the bird, the longer the incubation period. The duration of the incubation period is then one of the traits that defines a bird’s physical characteristics.

Also, the soli-lunar timing of the hatching of the geese reveals that the birds’ behavior is repeated from one year to the next and is not cued by the weather and photoperiod as is commonly proposed9. The geese are on a different calendar than the one we use to track them. They are on their biological time. The shift of the hatching date occurs because the moon’s phase does not each year synchronize with that of the sun. The timing of Easter demonstrates how this works. This religious holiday falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. In 2004, Easter was on April 11, but in 2005 and 2006 it fell on March 27 and April 16. The holiday moves because the 29.5-day lunar cycle does not divide wholly into the 365-day-plus solar calendar. When the geese synchronize an event to both the sun and moon, the timing similarly appears to move randomly from one year to the next.

Now, at last, we can determine if geese exist on Cygnus 3. If these birds follow a soli-lunar rhythm and if the incubation period of their eggs times them to hatch under the darkest nights (in more southern latitudes) and if the birds’ physiology is governed by melatonin levels linked to the absolute levels of darkness, then a longer lunar cycle would extend the incubation period. The creature would have to match its behavior to the celestial rhythms. If the lunation period were longer, the bird likely would be much larger than the goose, perhaps bigger than an ostrich, for an extended incubation of eggs usually corresponds to a more sizable

bird. With a lunar month 60 days long, we can conclude there are no geese at present, on Cygnus 3. Moreover, if the soli-lunar lock crosses the biological spectrum, there is not likely to be life like us or like any of the other animals and plants we know off of our planet earth.

Notes1 Boorstin, Daniel J. The Discoverers: A History of

Man’s Search to Know His World and Himself. New York:

2 Tarlow, Elisa, M.; Hau, Michaela; Anderson, David J.; and Wikelski, Martin Diel “Changes in Plasma Melatonin and Corticosterone Concentrations in Tropical Nazca Boobies (Sula granti) in Relation to Moon Phase and Age.” General and Comparative Endocrinology 133: 297-304.

3 Palmer, John D. The Living Clock: The Orchestrator of Biological Rhythms. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2002.

4 Archibald, H. L. “Spring Drumming Patterns of Ruffed Grouse. Auk 93, 4 (1976): 808-29.

5 Morell, T.E., Yahner, R.H. & Harkness, W.L. “Factors Affecting Detection of Great Horned Owls by Using Broadcast Vocalizations.” Wildlife Society Bulletin 19, 4 (1991): 481-88.

6 Pyle, Peter; Nur, Nadav; R. Henderson, Philip; and DeSante, David F. “The Effects of Weather and Lunar Cycle on Nocturnal Migration of Landbirds at Southeast Farallon Island, California.” The Condor 95 (1993): 343-61.

7 Gillian, Baker and Rene Dekker. Lunar Synchrony in the Reproduction of the Moluccan Megapode Megapodius wallacei. Ibis 142 (2000): 382-88.

8 Taylor, Bernie. Biological Time. Newberg, Oregon: The Ea Press, 2004.

9 Dibley, David Allen. The Sibley Guide to Bird Life & Behavior. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 2001.

CENTERWild-goose Chase

The only goose to inhabit the sky flew the coop in the centuries following its placement on the celestial map in 1687 by Johannes Hevelius. He contrived Anser the Goose from faint stars near two other avian constellations, Cygnus the Swan and Aquila the Eagle, but cooked its goose by lodging it in the mouth of Vulpecula the Fox. Vulpecula, too, first appeared in Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia, a pictorial Atlas Hevelius published in the Baltic city Gdansk (Danzig). Another species of celestial geese is considered this month by Bernie Taylor. His Boeing Science Writing Contest article, “Are There Geese on Cygnus 3?,” evaluates the likelihood of geese on another planet through an assessment of the influence on moonlight on geese much closer to home. (collection E.C. Krupp)


All Fall DownKara Knack

The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop, The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.

Edward Fitzgerald(1809-1883)The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

Panspermia: a theory propounded in the 19th century in opposition to the theory of spontaneous generation and holding that reproductive bodies of living organisms exist throughout the universe and develop wherever the environment is favorable.

Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary

There’s a lot of stuff raining down on us from space. You have to figure this pummeling is taking its toll on us/ Even more troubling,

most of it is invisible. In fact, we not only fail to see it, we don’t hear it, smell it, taste it, or touch it. It takes specially designed instruments to detect this material at all.

Now when it comes to rain, it’s pretty easy to if it’s falling. If we’re out in it, we get wet. We also can measure just how much rain falls with an instrument, the rain gauge. The water it collects provides some perspective on the size and intensity of the storm.

Cosmic rays and neutrinos are peppering the planet all of the time, but because they are subatomic, we have no idea we are caught in the shower. Cloud chambers, spark chambers and neutrino observatories, however, are able to measure the cosmic deluge.

We don’t just get splashed with an insubstantial brush with atomic particles, however. Sometimes rocks fall out of the sky. We have been collecting the meteorites for a long time, probably ever since the innovation of the opposable thumb that allows us to pick them up from the ground. Recently, we started learning enough about these rocks from space to see in them the story of our solar system.

In January, 2006, the Stardust mission returned from outer space with thousand of microscoping particles it harvested from comet Wild 2. Unexpected minerals were included in the mix returned from afar. They included olivine, which is found in Hawaiian sand, and fosterite, a silicate

mineral found in the gemstone peridot. When jewelry is involved, some of us really want to know.

Bacteria can and have survived the extreme conctions of space, and their survival hints that seeds of life may be dispersed, in the words of John Lennon, all across the universe. All of this debris is actually our history. It is also our future, and if we need to line our hats with protective tin foil or smear our skin with sunscreen, we had better get with the program.

Stuff falling from the sky urges us to pay attention. New information help ensure our survival.

Public astronomy provides access to the instruments, ideas, and information. Friends Of The Observatory understands this enterprise is really enlightened self-interest. We can’t get you out of the rain, but we can make room for you under our umbrella.

Friends Of The ObservatoryP.O. Box 27310

Los Angeles, California90027-0310

(818) 846-3686


The g. Bruce Blair Medal was presented to John Christopher Butler by the Western Amateur Astronomers at the 2006 Riverside

Telescope Makers Conference at Big Bear, California, on the Memorial Day weekend. Mr. Butler is a science artist. Astronomically informed and visually articulate, he has been working as an independent contractor at Griffith Observatory and has been assisting research and development of imagery for the new planetarium show, “Centered in the Universe<” which is scheduled for presentation in the Samuel Oschin Planetarium when Griffith Observatory reopens in late fall. He has also been constructing animated sequences for many of the 65 new exhibits that are part of Griffith Observatory’s major renovation and expansion.

Mr. Butler’s astronomical art has exhibited in more than 27 countries around the world. Many newspapers, magazines, and books have commissioned his illustrations. He has been the director of a children’s science museum, a technical illustrator for a computer manufacturer, and a financial analyst (!) on the Space Shuttle program at Rockwell International. He continues to perform as a tour quide on the Queen Mary and operates its shipboard planetarium. Blessed with a sly wit, he is

also a popular and reliably entertaining lecturer at meetings of the Orange County Astronomers.

Through these efforts and more, he has stimulated enthusiasm for astronomy and cultivated knowledge of science in many adults and children, and for these contributions he was selected to receive the G. Bruce Blair Medal.

Because Mr. Butler is so closely affiliated with Griffith Observatory, the Observatory claims him as the third Observatory veteran, after Dr. Dinsmore Alter and Dr. E.C. Krupp, to receive the G. Bruce Blair Medal.

For more on Chris Butler’s astronomical art and other celestial endeavors, please visit www.sciencecenter.net/butlerart

Griffith Observatory’s Chris Butler Awarded

G. Bruce Blair Medal

Above: Chris Butler. Below left: the G. Bruce Blair Medal (photographs Tony Cook, Griffith Observatory)







Observers not located in the Pacific Time zone should apply these corrections to Sky Calendar times where appropriate:

Mountain Time add 1 hourCentral Time add 2 hoursEastern Time add 3 hoursUniversal Time add 7 hours

0 0 0

SUNThe sun moves from Gemini the Twins into Cancer the Crab on the 21st. As seen from Los Angeles, the sun’s noontime elevation decreases from 79˚ on the 1st to 74˚ on the 31st, while its rising point on the horizon moves slowly southward from 29˚ north of east to 22˚ north of east on the same dates. On the 15th, the day is 14h 11m long, with sunrise at 5:54 a.m. and sunset at 8:03 p.m. from Los Angeles.

7 8 5

MOONLunation No. 1033

First Quarter July 3 9:37 a.m.Full Moon July 10 8:02 p.m.Last Quarter July 17 12:12 p.m.

Lunation No. 1034New Moon July 24 9:31 p.m.

- F @

PLANETSMercury passes inferior conjunction (nearly between earth and the sun) on the 17th and is too close to the sun to be observed this month.

Venus (mag. -3.7) moves from Taurus the Bull to Orion the Hunter on the 17th and into Gemini the Twins on the 19th. The brightest planet rises at 3:53 a.m. on the 15th and reaches an altitude of 23˚ above the east-northeast horizon at sunrise. Through a telescope, the planet presents a gibbous disk, 89 percent lit and only 11 arcseconds wide. The slender

waning crescent moon appears 7˚ to the upper left of Venus on the 22nd and 8˚ to the lower left of the planet on the following morning. These pairings are best seen near dawn at about 5 a.m.

Mars, in Leo the Lion, is too distant and low to be a target of telescopic observation as it continues its prolonged departure from the evening sky. The planet will, however, make two pairings with other objects that should be interesting to view with binoculars. The first is a passage by the bright star Regulus (mag. +1.4 ) in Leo. The passage is best observed during twilight on consecutive evenings (starting on the 20th) at 8:45 p.m., when the pair is about 10˚ above the western horizon. Mars appears 1˚ to the right of Regulus on the 20th, 42 arcminutes to upper right of the star on 21st, 42 arcminutes above Regulus on the 22nd, and 1˚ above and to the left of Regulus on the 23rd. The waxing crescent moon poses 4˚ to the upper left of Mars on the 27th.

Jupiter (mag. -2.2), in Libra the Scales, stands 36˚ high in the southwest at 9:30 p.m., the end of evening twilight. The brilliant planet outshines any star, and presents telescopic observers with a slightly flattened disk, 39 arcseconds wide. The waxing gibbous moon passes 6 degrees south of Jupiter on the 5th.

Saturn (mag. +0.4), in Cancer the Crab, makes its exit from the evening sky this month. The ringed planet will be increasingly difficult to spot above the west-northwest horizon as it gradually vanishes into the bright evening twilight. At midmonth it sets at 9:09 p.m., and by the 31st it sets at 8:13 p.m., only 20 minutes after the sun.

Uranus (mag. +5.8), in eastern Aquarius, is best placed for telescopic observation when it transits, 49˚ above the south point on the horizon, at 4:08 a.m. at mid-month. Its coordinates are then RA 23h

3.6m, Dec. -6˚ 53’.

Neptune (mag. +7.8) is in eastern Capricornus at position R.A. 21h 26.1m, Dec. -15˚ 17’ at

Sky Calendar for July, 2006Anthony Cook

Griffith Observatory


midmonth. It then rises at 9:31 p.m. and transits 40˚ above the southern horizon at 2:50 a.m. on the 15th.

SPECIAL EVENTSThe earth is at aphelion (its farthest orbital excursion from the sun) – 94,507,890 miles – at 4 p.m. on Monday, July 3rd. It is our north pole’s tilt toward the sun at this time of year, not the distance from the sun that causes the northern hemisphere summer season. We shall be 3,108,160 miles (about 3 percent) closer to the sun at perihelion (the closest orbital approach to the sun) this coming January 3rd.

The Delta Aquarid meteor shower, the year’s longest major shower, reaches its peak on the night of the 27th, although its meteors actually fall during the

second half of July and most of August. Combined with the Perseids, which peak on August 12th, these weeks are the best of the year for meteor watching. The Delta Aquarids seem to be a loose system of perhaps five separate meteor streams that radiate from the constellation Aquarius, and they fall all night. The moon will not interfere with viewing this year.

The classic Observatory on Mt. Hollywood is closed to the public through fall, 2006, for renovation. A public telescope is open for free viewing of the sky at Griffith Observatory Satellite facility in the northeast corner of Griffith Park, adjacent to the Los Angeles Zoo, from dark until 9:45 p.m. nightly except Mondays. There are two public star parties this month– on Saturday, July 1st, and Saturday, July 29th. Call the Sky Report at (323) 663-8171 for a four-minute message giving the latest news on what’s happening in the sky, or visit the Observatory’s World Wide Web site at www.GriffithObs.org.

BACK COVERBiological Time

In Biological Time, naturalist Bernie Taylor demonstrates how “plants and animals time themselves by rhythms of light and darkness.” Examining further the acquisition of this knowledge by prehistoric, ancient, and traditional peoples, he argues its impact can be detected in symbol and ritual. This month’s lead article, “Are There Geese on Cygnus 3?,” by Bernie Taylor, adds additional evidence for moonlight-factored behavior in birds. In particular, the eggs of the lesser snow goose preferentially hatch during the darker nights of the moon, and Canada’s Cree Indians incorporate this information into their yearly lunar count. Copies of Biological Time (2004) may be purchased from the Ea Press at www.TheEaPress.com.

Scorpius the Scorpion is at right and Sagittarius the Archer is at lower left in this view cast toward the center of the Milky Way. Taken from the Angeles Crest Highway a few miles northeast of Mt. Wilson Observatory, a thick marine layer muted the glow of urban Los Angeles. Compare this view to the bottom of the Evening Sky in July map on the next page. (image Anthony Cook, Canon D20a DSLR camera, 8 minute exposure at ISO 800, 6 May 2006)


To use: Hold the chart over your head and orient it so that the directions on the outside of the chart match the directions on the ground. The chart shows the entire sky from horizon to horizon at the time indicated.This chart is set for the latitude of Los Angeles (34° north), but it is useful throughout the continental United States and around the world at a similar latitude.Planet positions are plotted for the 15th of the month. Sidereal times are: Evening chart, 16h

45m; Morning chart, 21h 45m.

Chart TimesEvening Sky

11:00 p.m. P.D.T. July 110:00 p.m. P.D.T. July 15 9:00 p.m. P.D.T. July 31

Morning Sky 4:00 a.m. P.D.T. July 1 3:00 a.m. P.D.T. July 15 2:00 a.m. P.D.T. July 31

EVENING SKY IN AUGUST


STAR CHART 2

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MORNING SKY IN AUGUST

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Documents

VOL. 70, N 8 • August 2006 • $2 · the Swan, where 2005 Boeing Science Writing Contest winner Bernie Taylor asks us whether geese could inhabitat a planet almost like—but not