The natural Navigation: The Right Course, Naturally

It has been quite a restless few days.

Last Saturday I spent the morning in London as a guest on BBC Radio 4′s Excess Baggage. In the evening  I led a group on a night walk. The conditions were perfect. We watched as blue turned to orange. Then as the orange faded to dark blue and black we were treated as Arcturus, Deneb, Altair, Vega, Capella and others began to appear. Lurking luminously between the silhouetted branches of a two hawthorns there was a bright white light in the east. It refused to move or twinkle. It wasn’t an aircraft or a star, it was Jupiter rising to rule the sky. We looked at five different methods for finding the North Star.

Thank you to all 400 who came to a Night of Adventure in Bristol on Monday. Great cause, great audience, fun night. If this night comes to…

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A blog of two halves for you today.

Late September can bring some of the best early evening experiences for those who enjoy looking upwards.

Visibility is likely to fluctuate a bit, but it looks as though we may get some of the best stargazing weather of the year over the next few nights. It promises to be warm enough to enjoy long spells outside, but without the crazily late sunsets of midsummer.

I’ll point out a few of the things worth looking for in a minute, but first just a few words about this weather.

On my courses I encourage people to take note of shifts in wind direction and how this relates to changes in weather patterns. If the weather is unseasonably warm or cold, we should expect some deviation from the prevailing wind direction, southwest.

The image above shows the UK (at lunchtime tomorrow) sandwiched neatly between…

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UPDATE:

My sources tell me that the first is a Magpie Inkcap (Coprinopsis picaceus) and the second is Green Elf Cup/Wood cup/Stain (Chlorociboria aeruginascens).

My thanks, in no particular order, to: Nick Weston, Brian and Ross Gardner.

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A thousand apologies for that title.

Seriously now, are there any fungi experts out there?

Yesterday I came across these two rather fun specimens during a family walk in our local woods. Thought one was a Panther cap, but looks a bit too ‘pointy’ for that. The blue one is beautiful, but not one I can even guess at. I’m assuming it is a fungus, but could be a lichen at a stretch I suppose?

If anyone knows someone in the know please could you waft these images under their expert noses. Much obliged. Credit will be given. My email address is here.

On a different subject, my thanks…

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The forecast for this weekend seems intent on lulling us into believing that the summer has life in it yet, after weeks on the resuscitation table.

If we’re in the mood for deluding ourselves that there is more of this come, then the ‘Summer Triangle‘ is worth looking out for. It is a collection of three bright stars that are overhead near midnight in midsummer, but still clearly visible well through autumn and even into the early evening winter sky. It is not a constellation at all, but a nickname for the three brightest stars, Vega, Deneb and Altair, from three different constellations, Lyra, Cygnus and Aquila.

So, as the nights draw in and you find yourself shivering looking up, search out the ‘Summer’ triangle to warm you.