Seeing Stars Blog

Seeing Stars, a blog by Susan Cushing, a Master Naturalist, astro-educator, amateur astronomer,  and ‘Night Naturalist’ explores our night sky and what our ‘neighbors’ -the animals, birds, insects and plants- are doing between dusk and dawn. Susan's blog also explores how our artificial light affects the world around us and simple, safe ways we can protect and enjoy our dark skies.

Current Blog

August 25, 2025   Noctilucent Clouds

Clouds float by over our heads almost daily. We think of them as not too far away and know they are several hundred to tens of thousands of feet above, but yet move in the same atmosphere we breathe and feel at the surface of the Earth.             

Above the clouds the atmosphere fades into outer space, where there are no clouds, right? Not so fast! There are many layers of atmosphere above our breathable atmosphere. The thin band of air we breathe, the troposphere, rises between 7-11 miles above us, less than the distance between Viola and Viroqua. Beyond that are increasingly empty layers of particles still connected to Earth. Somewhere between 30-50 miles above the surface at the edge of the mesosphere, space dust, volcanic dust, water molecules and cold temperatures combine to sometimes create noctilucent clouds. They form at temperatures below -184F in streaks and bands of pale, luminous blue, at between 50-65 degrees latitude. They can only be seen during Astronomical Twilight when both the viewer and the lower atmosphere are in shadow but that high layer of particles is still lit by the Sun. They form only in summer, when vertical winds cause the upper atmosphere to be colder than in winter.

Glowing like no cloud formed closer to earth, noctilucent clouds are one of the most distant formations made in Earth’s atmosphere. Sometimes these clouds form in southern latitudes too but may be much rarer there. Rocket exhaust vapor may cause noctilucent clouds to form. In 2014 a noctilucent cloud formed over Florida after a rocket was launched.

Ephemeral, eerily lit, glowing blue noctilucent clouds in a dark sky sprinkled with stars are as much a thrill to see as the Northern Lights rising high into the night. Look for them as night falls if you are traveling north in the summer. It’s possible you might see them even over the Driftless skies.

Past Blogs

August 18, 2025   Lights Out for Birds

Have you noticed? The birds are leaving again on their long journeys south for the winter. Now we know many millions of birds die each year because they crash into our lit windows as they pass by at night. Seeing the ground below big windows and bright lights littered with dying birds in the morning never needs to happen now that we have simple solutions to stop the carnage.

The International Lights Out Program is beginning to help. From August 15th to November 31st lights are being turned off from 11pm to 6am in cities across the country so the birds can safely fly by. From coast to coast as well as across Canada dozens of cities are beginning to change their night lighting for the birds. Even the Twin Towers Tribute searchlights in New York City are turned off during bird migration hours. Our Driftless hills hosts many birds that use the Mississippi flyway from the arctic to the tropics twice each year. Your home or business can be their last stop or help them on their way. Bright lights from businesses and large buildings are the most dangerous.

I live where it is dark at night, yet migrating birds become caught at our lit windows, fluttering helplessly for hours. You might not notice the birds outside your window, so please join me in remembering to close curtains after dark and turn off outdoor lights during migration hours.

Join the Lights Out for Bird Migration, especially if your business has big, bright, outdoor lights. Go to www.audubon.org to find out how easy it is to allow room for birds to fly by while saving money, and join cities and people all across the US helping the birds fly by. How cool is that? Be part of why where we live becomes known for making both birds and people happy.  (back)

August 11, 2025   Daytime Stargazing 

Remember when your parents told you to ‘never look directly at the Sun’? And how we sneaked peaks anyway, because kids are curious. And how that peak told us in no uncertain terms not to do that again? Well, whether you are a child or a grown-up this month we have the rare opportunity to gaze at the surface of the Sun and not go blind. 

For 39 years the Northwest Suburban Astronomers from Chicago have come to Wildcat Mountain State Park for a week in August to look at the night sky with their telescopes. From small but powerful telescopes the size of a loaf of bread to tall tubes of mirrors that need a ladder to reach the eyepiece, they set up telescopes all around the meadow. On August 17th between 1 and 4pm telescopes with special filters will be set up for looking at the Sun so you can stargaze with the astronomers during the day.

The Sun is our own special star, the closest star by far to Earth. The Sun’s surface is complex and changes rapidly. We are familiar with solar flares and sunspots but there are many other features on the complex surface. As the intense activity in the interior of the Sun moves materials and energy toward the surface bumps, bubbles, swirls, dark spots, plumes and flares constantly change the surface we can see.

For a special summer outing take your family to see the friendly astronomers and impressive telescopes, and a rare chance to see our own star up close. I’ll be there, and hope you can join me. 

Take advantage of another unique sky viewing opportunity on August 16th when the telescopes will be available to the public for night time stargazing. Make a weekend of stargazing for family and friends, you’ll be amazed.  (back)

August 4, 2025  August Starry Sky

August is the height of summer, gardens are overflowing, days are hot and the nights are filled with stars. Clear winter night stars sparkle in the cold air and seem closer and brighter. But August nights offer many star gazing pleasures. From beautiful sunsets and sunrises to constellations to planets moving into view to the best meteor shower of the year, these nights are spectacular. Stargazers in the northern hemisphere make sure to be out after dark in August.

Begin with watching the full Sturgeon Moon rise on the 9th. There is a beautiful lineup of four visible planets, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter and Saturn, on the 11th  in the early morning sky. Get up early, make some tea and enjoy the light show.

The Perseid Meteor shower peaks on the 11th and 12th. This year it coincides with the full moon most of the night. Some people think the full moon interferes with seeing the most ‘falling stars’ but I think it simply makes a different light show. You’ll still see meteors, as well as get to look at the beautiful moon! The Perseid Meteor shower can be seen for several days before and after this date.

For the next week the moon and planets will move around each other in a complex dance making beautiful patterns in the sky as the moon wanes to a fainter crescent.

Summer constellations to look for are Sagittarius in the center of our galaxy, the Big Dipper and Little Dipper and nearly overhead, between the Big Dipper and Sagittarius is Lyra. Then look for the three stars Vega, Deneb and Altair that make the Summer Triangle. Vega, one of the brightest stars in the sky is in Lyra. A star chart and a lawn chair are your tickets to exploring at least a small part of the universe. (back)

July 28, 2025   Light and Chicken Development

There are over 34 billion domestic chickens in the world, and over 9 billion in the US. Most are raised under artificial lights set to unnatural time intervals to maximize growth. Information on how that affects them is of great interest to those raising the chickens. Today a broiler chicken’s life ends as someone’s dinner at 40 days because of manipulation of feed, medications, and the amount of light in the chicken barn.

We know light and dark cycles regulate biological rhythms and functions and each year we learn more ways light affects more aspects of life. While  chicken growers are increasing speed of growth by manipulating light other unnoticed changes are also happening.

 Researchers in Sweden and Brazil exposed chickens to artificial light schedules early in life, then examined RNA and DNA gene activity in the pineal gland in the brain for changes from a normal baseline. The epigenome, that turns DNA on and off, was most affected. The scientists admitted surprise to find the “difference between males and females in the pineal gland almost disappeared under chronic light stress” and the female chickens became more male-like even though their DNA did not change. The DNA was turned off, not changed. Though both male and female birds were affected, Dr. Carlos Guerrero-Bosagna said, “This suggests female birds are particularly vulnerable to environmental stress…These findings raise questions…about how artificial lighting may affect biological rhythms in other species, including humans”. 

It's interesting their conclusion noted the question of human response to artificial light. I take the hint. While waiting for those with the knowledge to find more answers about the effects of light on our lives, I’m keeping as much natural dark night sky around our home as possible. (back)

July 21, 2025   The Summer Triangle

This week we’ll tour the Summer Triangle, which is an ‘asterism’, a pattern of stars that are recognized but not defined quite the same as a constellation. Three of the brightest stars in the sky, Deneb, Altair and Vega make the Summer Triangle, also known as the ‘Navigator’s Triangle’ because it can be seen everywhere in the northern hemisphere and from most places in the southern hemisphere. Used for centuries for navigation by sailors as well as land travelers, this star pattern was described by the Chinese at least 2,600 years ago as well as mentioned as part of Japanese and Korean stories and festivals.

Altair, in the constellation Aquilla, is located on the celestial equator. Vega is the fifth brightest star in the sky and was our northern pole star about 14,000 years ago. Vega will again be the ‘north star’ in 13,727 years. Deneb is a blue supergiant star. Even though it is between 1400 and 2600 light years away it is one of the brightest stars in our sky. In 9800AD Deneb will be almost aligned to be our pole star. Stars take turns being our ‘north star’ depending on which direction the earth tilts.

These three stars are easy to find in the summer sky and each can be used to find other astronomical objects and orient to directions. On summer nights the Summer Triangle is nearly overhead and rises in the east at sunset and sets in the west at sunrise.

Each star’s name relates to birds. Vega is Arabic for ‘falling eagle’. Altair means ‘flying eagle’ and Deneb means ‘the tail of the hen’. We locate Deneb in the tail of Cygnus, the swan. 

Explore orienting yourself to the sky and the land around you by finding this reliable, ancient map of stars. (back)

July 14, 2025   What About Those Bulbs?

We’ve toured cities, businesses, parks and other places that have made lighting changes to increased safety and reduce pollution and costs. We’ve considered what are desirable criteria for choosing a light. Now, what exactly are smart, efficient light bulbs and where do we find them?

The light that does minimal interference to normal dark night sky has a Kelvin (K) rating of under 2700K. The Kelvin number is on every light bulb package. Ignore the ‘warm’, ‘cool’, ‘daylight’, or other descriptions as there is no standard they agree on.  Low Kelvin numbers mean warm color-temperature light that does not scatter as much into the atmosphere. It does not relate to the amount of light given off by the bulb. A warm color- temperature bulb gives the same amount of light as any other bulb of the same lumens. 

Light rated above 2700K becomes more like daylight the higher the number, in that it scatters much more into the atmosphere. This is wasted light that you pay for. One little doorway light changed will affect the life around you as well as your light bill over time, but if you have floodlights or multiple lights the difference to everyone nearby and your wallet will be noticed very quickly.

Go to the Selecting Bulbs page at  https://www.4darkskies.org/home/resources/selecting-bulbs for places to find bulbs. Also ask your local hardware or big box store to stock these lighting options. When they get requests they offer the product but some stores are not aware yet of the recent improvements in light bulb options. 

If you are involved in decision making about any outdoor lighting, before replacing fixtures and bulbs that are wearing out become informed about what’s new in lighting that has benefits we didn’t think of in the past. Good lighting and better savings are now easy choices. (back)

July 7, 2025   Good Lights Bad Lights

There’s more news lately about light pollution and the loss of starry skies. But artificial light has changed life for the better in so many ways. Is artificial light bad, or good?

As with many things, jumping to a foregone conclusion is not helpful and so it is with understanding artificial light. There is no denying that being able to see at night is very important for many reasons. We are safer and can do many things with adequate artificial light. Rather than considering light as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, let’s look at whether it is useful or wasteful, cost effective or expensive, polluting or conserving our resources.

The problems with artificial light have to do with how much is wasted by dispersing into the atmosphere and the sky, the damage that causes to all forms of life, the wasted energy given off as heat and the 3 billion dollars or more each year that is spent on that waste in the US alone. An incandescent bulb is 90% and an LED bulb is 30% waste heat. How much of that is part of your electric bill?

We now have some good examples in our communities of lighting that does not produce waste and pollution. Light bulbs and fixtures are available at the same or even less cost than those commonly used. There is technical and hands-on help for making smart lighting changes. There are large cities that have successfully changed to smarter lighting and saved a lot of money in doing so. Tucson, Arizona is a good example with about a million people benefiting from dark sky lighting. Changes are being made all over the world to have effective, safe, affordable lighting. Check out the possibilities. Visit these websites: www.4darkskies.org  (this is the Kickapoo Valley Dark Sky Initiative website) www.darksky.org  www.starryskiesnorth.org. Light up your life with smart, healthy, cost effective light. (back)

June 30, 2025   Lights to Live By

Last week I talked about how to consider the quality of lighting. Now let’s tour some examples to experience how we can have it all; a healthy, functioning world and the light we need to see well at night.

We can go to Europe where many places have made advanced changes in lighting. Or we can go to some National Parks, or urban locations in Illinois, Ohio, Oregon, Wyoming, Missouri, and other places. Arizona has numerous areas that control light pollution. Flagstaff, a city of over 75,000 residents is the first Dark Sky city in the US. Tucson, Arizona has a metropolitan area population of over one million people benefitting from dark sky ordnances, and the surrounding Pima County also has dark sky ordnances for many years. If you are traveling, watch for places that have made those changes. 

Now we can experience these smarter lighting choices close to home. Several communities, parks and businesses have made the change to save money and be good neighbors too. Take a drive in the evening and check out these recently upgraded lights.

Visit the La Farge Village Park and Emergency Services building, the sample lights on Rock Avenue in Viroqua, the Ontario Village Hall and Fire Station, the Kickapoo Valley Reserve Visitor Center, and Wildcat Mountain State Park. Everything that needs light is well illuminated in these places but there is little glare and little wasted light going out into the sky.

As with all technology, artificial lighting is changing. We did not know decades ago the problems artificial light caused. As we learn, we are developing better options to have the light we need without the inadvertent problems it can cause.

Become familiar with the new technology. Then join those who are already benefitting from the improved choices in lighting and start saving. (back)

June 23, 2025   The Green Flash

There is a special event that happens at sunset called a Green Flash or a Green Rim. As the last edge of the sun disappears below the horizon, sometimes a green flash of light shoots up from the edge of the sun, or the rim of the sun is green. Caused by Earth’s atmosphere acting as a prism, light near the horizon is separated into the color spectrum. The lower edge of the sun is more red and the upper edge is always green. The sun is below the horizon so we never see the lower, red edge at that moment.

Seen most easily in dry, still air, Green Flashes can be spectacular or faint and take both luck and planning to see. 

Early this spring I stood on the edge of the Mt. Lemmon summit near Tucson, Arizona just before sunset. Guided by University of Arizona astronomers, we carefully watched the top edge of the sun at the horizon, and then we saw it. A  neon green band of light arced around the sun’s edge and two bright green flares of light shot upward. For two seconds we saw what the astronomers called ‘the most spectacular’ green flare they had ever seen. It was beautiful!

I have seen faint Green Flares in Wisconsin. Maybe you can too. Here’s how to look for them. Of course, never look directly at the sun. Permanent damage to your eyes is almost guaranteed. It is safe to look after the sun has gone below the horizon and only the tiniest rim of light is left. That is the only time a Green Flare can occur, so there is no advantage to looking at the sun before that. On a clear, calm evening look just to the side of the sun as it disappears. Like rainbows and Northern Lights, most of the time they are not there but when they are it is worth the many times you’ve tried to see them. (back)

June 16, 2025   Fireflies    

Once a year the stars seem to fall from the sky into the meadows and pastures all around us. If you walk out to open grassy fields at sunset in June you may walk through fields of floating stars.

Rising from the grass in vast numbers as the real stars pull the curtain of night over our heads, countless adult Lampyridae beetles embroider designs on the darkness in a dizzying display of swirls and dashes of yellow or green light.

Their aerial light show is the last part of a life lived underground for a year or two  as one inch long larvae. After munching on slugs and worms, the larvae change into adult form with wings and for a few warm evenings in early summer become one of Nature’s most loved spectacles.

There are fireflies on every continent but Antarctica, and there are at least 2,200 species in the world. As well as making light, they have complex lives.

Fireflies need strong defenses to balance their visibility. One strategy they have is to expel drops of blood to repel predators. Bats are observed to avoid them.

Unlike our artificial lightbulbs that give off 10% light and 90% heat, fireflies have a ‘cold’ light, there is no heat involved. Two chemicals in their bodies interact to make their light. They can adjust the light by how much oxygen they allow to mix with the two chemicals.

In Japan long ago, women pinned fireflies in their elaborate hairdos for evening walk through lamplit towns and parks.

Fireflies have been lighting summer evenings for over 100 million years but are now disappearing all over the world. They are still here in our meadows so take a walk after dark in a grassy field near you and enjoy their special summer night light show. (back)

June 9, 2025   Hatching Baby Birds

It sure looks simple to us, how birds just sit on their eggs for a few days and then the baby birds hatch themselves. But as we found out about mosquitos, there is more going on than we notice.

Birds work hard to incubate their young. During the day they must feed themselves and keep the eggs consistently warm and safe from predators. 

Because chicks develop externally from the mother bird in the egg they are vulnerable to environmental conditions, especially temperature changes, so those parent birds work hard to care for them each day. During the night birds catch up on their rest while sleeping on their eggs, keeping egg temperature stable. 

Research in England found that night-time incubation restlessness strongly reduced hatching success because egg temperature varied. There can be numerous reasons a bird feels restless at night but artificial light was found to be a significant factor disturbing the birds. The more egg temperature varied at night, the lower the hatching success.

The study did not look at adult bird health in relation to exposure to artificial light at night. But if anyone works hard all day and does not sleep well at night there are eventually unavoidable bad effects on health. When you are tossing and turning after a long day and know you’ll be tired in the morning because you didn’t get enough sleep, you may be sharing a restless night with the little song bird out in your yard or in the nearby park who is also struggling just like you, to get a good night’s sleep.

Birds are disappearing all over the world so if we can improve any one of the problems they have it could help them deal with other stresses. Artificial light at night is the easy one to fix.

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June 2, 2025   Mosquitoes

Well, they’re back. A couple ankle bites while sitting on the porch in the evening gives notice the insect we universally dislike is here for the summer. But wait, is our discomfort the whole story? As usual, there is more going on in Nature than we realize. Mosquitoes deserve a closer look.

Mosquitoes were feasting on dinosaur blood long ago. Now they visit us because often there are not many other options. They will feast on amphibians, earthworms, armadillos, and even some kinds of fish as well as mammals. We may not even be their favorite meal, if they have another choice.  All mosquitoes need nectar and pollen for food. Many but not all need one blood meal for reproduction but only a hundred or so of the thousands of species carry diseases to humans.  Some species’ larvae eat the larvae of other mosquitoes. Humans use these species in rice fields and other areas to eat larvae of disease-carrying mosquitoes.

Many mosquitoes are brightly colored or striped, or have elaborate feathery legs and some are very large. The ‘elephant mosquito’ eats only nectar and is almost an inch long with long, long legs that drift below them as they fly.

We are learning they are significant pollinators. Feeding on flowers at night, their work is unnoticed by us. Because of their large numbers they do a lot of the essential pollen transportation the flowers need.

Changing outdoor lights to a warmer color temperature that does not attract insects and using a small fan in your outdoor seating area can reduce mosquitoes’ attention on you.

So swat away if one is biting you, but skip the bug zappers that kill all the bugs the plants depend on, and take a closer look around plants at twilight, you might see those unexpected flower-tenders at work.

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May 26, 2025   Flying With Moths

There are many fantasy stories of humans flying on the backs of birds and even butterflies. Let’s go flying with moths for a different view of the world.

We’ve all seen moths endlessly fluttering around lights at night. We don’t realize most of them die there, unable to escape. What’s going on?

As humans become aware of the value of moths we have learned more about why moths and other insects are attracted to outdoor lights. 

Moths us low levels of light from the night sky to stabilize their flight. ‘Dorsal light response’ causes moths to keep their back facing the brightest object they can see to orient for normal flight at night. For millions of years this has been the night sky.

Excessively bright artificial lights interfere with moths seeing the sky, so they orient their backs to our outdoor lights and cannot fly away. They fly up until they stall and fall, or fly inverted until they crash and die, trying to keep their backs to the light. What looks to us like harmless fluttering is really the moths struggling to escape the light.

Many moths migrate, often across continents, mountain ranges and oceans. Some fly one to two miles high. Hummingbird hawk moth, Painted Lady, and many others share the Monarch butterfly’s long journey across the continent. When you first notice a familiar moth it may be because they have just arrived from a long journey. Migrating at night, moths and other insects have the same problems with artificial lights that migrating birds have.

Turn off outdoor lights when not using them and shield them to prevent light from leaking upward. Let the moths fly free to pollinate the plants we love and need. The cost is small, the effort takes only a few minutes, but the benefits for not only moths but humans is incalculable.

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May 19, 2025   More About Moths

Any one animal, plant, or element of the living world, when closely observed, is intricate, beautiful, unique, does something surprising, and always does something useful. 

Moths are one of those seemingly unremarkable creatures we ignore or kill without thinking. Let’s take a closer look at a very important part of warm weather nights.

Moths and butterflies share the order Lepidoptera. There are over 160,000 species of moths, ten times the number of butterfly species. We can tell whether the winged beauty we are looking at is moth or butterfly by the antenna. Butterflies have thin antenna with a ball at the end, moths have feathery antenna-most of the time. In Nature there are many variations so sometimes you may see a moth with thin antenna.

Moth caterpillars are often more colorful than the adult moth. The large, bright green poplar hawk moth caterpillar has white stripes and dots and a long white ‘horn’ but the moth is shades of gray and brown, blending in well with tree bark. The familiar ‘woolly bear’ caterpillar has orange and black bands, but turns into an Isabella Tiger moth with pale yellow-brown or reddish-brown colors. Cecropia moths are beautiful, but when in caterpillar form are positively festive, with bright green bodies with red and yellow-tipped protrusions and black spines.

Moths developed around 190 million years ago, long before butterflies showed up. The few moths that eat human crops that have replaced their natural foods are far outnumbered by countless moths that plants depend on for reproduction. The cycle of life between caterpillar eating leaves, moth pollinating the plant, and the plant reproducing has worked well for for millions of years. This summer take a closer look at the moths flying silently from flower to flower through the night.

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May 12, 2025   Moths

When we see butterflies and bees at spring flowers it is also time for moths to be active. Moths are as varied and beautiful as butterflies. They are a major source of food for bats, small mammals, and birds, and are at least as important as bees and butterflies for pollination. Did you know there are more than ten times as many moth species as butterflies?

Moth caterpillars can be very beautiful. Look up pictures of Tussock, Io, and Imperial moth caterpillars, a few of the most striking species. The familiar and common ‘woolly bear’ caterpillar turns into an Isabella Tiger Moth.

Moths are complex as well as beautiful. Some moths make ultrasonic clicks to confuse bat echolocation. The beautiful Luna moth, as well as the Promethea, Polyphemus, Cecropia and others do not eat as adults and have no mouth. They store enough energy from eating while in caterpillar form to live a short time in moth form.

Some moth caterpillars’ hearts stop beating and their chemistry changes in cold weather to survive winter. Many moths also migrate, sometimes thousands of miles. 

Let the moths fly in the dark where they belong, not around your outdoor lights, where many of them die without reproducing or pollinating. 

Now that we know moths are essential for pollination of many plants we can give them room to live by choosing smart lighting for our night time visibility needs so moths are not trapped by light pollution. 

As the moths still surviving arrive with spring, help them by encouraging native plants they need for food and shelter. When one rests on your window, use a hand lens to see their unique colors and shapes. Add moths to the joys of summer nights. We need all the parts of the Web of Life.

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May 5, 2025   Evening Walks

When a doorway to a new experience is found, unexpected pleasures often come into our lives. Sunsets are our doorway to the beauty of the night. They are an invitation to walk through twilight into our beautiful hills and fields so that the end of your day gives you what the birds and animals get for free- beauty, pleasure, and rest.

If you are unfamiliar and unsure about being under the stars, in the darkening fields as the last colors fade from the sky, the sunset is a wide-open opportunity to add the always free, always available, always beautiful evening to your life. Before darkness comes, the twilight gives us light to see as we walk, and to feel connected to the fading daylight.

Especially in times of stress, when we are tired or worried, a free, easy to access pleasure is valuable. The busy business of the day retreats with the approach of night. Quiet, slowed movements fit the  fading light. Nature offers us relaxation and rest.

Let the sunset draw you out as the eastern sky turns indigo, the western sky displays pinks, oranges and gold, and birds make last flights in the dusk. A cloudy evening makes soft grays, pinks and blues, no less beautiful than the bright sunsets.

Most life is oriented to transition between activity and rest by the sunrise, sunset, and twilight times. We can use those times of day to slow down, relax, and receive the free gifts from the land and skies we are so fortunate to live within.

Walk out into the open at sunset. If you can’t do that, simply stand outside your door and watch the light change and the first stars come out. Fill the end of your day with rest and beauty. You’ll sleep better too.

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April 28, 2025   The Oldest Astronaut

On Sunday, April 20th, Don Pettit returned to earth after seven months in space on the International Space Station. He turned 70 years old as he hurtled toward earth in a tiny metal capsule, slowed by an enormous red-striped parachute that glowed in the rising sun.

Accompanied by two Russian astronauts, flying on a Soyuz landing craft, the three landed in Kazakhstan. Their fall to earth took about three hours, less time than it takes to fly to Los Angeles.

While on the ISS the astronauts shared research on plant growth, fire behavior in microgravity, and water sanitization. They lived together in tiny spaces under extreme conditions and got along, got their work done, and learned things that benefit the rest of humanity.

It’s interesting to consider the effort it takes to make a successful ISS mission. From ideas sketched on paper napkins to launch, experts from fifteen countries work together on everything from navigation to fuel technology, health, radiation effects, clothing, air supply, waste management, communications, supply chains, and hundreds more design, development, deployment, maintenance, and monitoring jobs. Each person must cooperate perfectly so that each bolt, instrument, communication, calculation and action is exactly right for the whole mission. It’s hard to imagine how that can work, but it does. NASA’s policy of international collaboration has been working successfully for decades.

During a 29 year career Pettit has spent more than 18 months in orbit, his life depending upon the cooperation of people from fifteen countries. Achieving a great goal shared by people from so many countries makes everyone involved feel great. Astronaut Pettit’s circle of friends is as big as the world, as big as his orbits around earth, grown over a lifetime of sharing knowledge and skills with people from all around the world.  (back)

April 21, 2025   Big City Lights

Tucson, Arizona has become one of my favorite places, partly because it has a long commitment to best lighting practices. With just over a million people, this city has shielded, low temperature street lights because of several astronomical observatories nearby. The city changed and shielded almost 20,000 street lights and now saves 2.16 million dollars a year on lighting. The 3,000K LED bulbs will last 25 years instead of 8 years for the old bulbs. Residents and businesses had little problem adjusting to the lighting changes and I and my husband and friends have enjoyed the way the city looks and the quiet feel of streets at night.

Wildlife and the surrounding environment are also big winners. While people look up from their backyards or streets and see stars the birds, insects, animals and the fragile but vital ecosystem has the dark nights needed to live and function normally.

There is no problem seeing where you are going there, whether walking or driving. The national, state and city parks in and around Tucson are minimally disturbed by light pollution. The city of Tucson knows outdoor light can be functional and also do little harm, and they are happy saving money too.

A bright, unshielded outdoor light causes glare that travels far across the land. Unshielded light shining in your neighbor’s eyes and even into their homes prevents them from controlling light on their property. Smart lighting is an excellent way to be a good neighbor. This is one problem that we can easily fix, and in doing so many other problems are improved. Shield that bulb to send light where it is useful and not upward, put in a 2200K LED bulb, then watch your savings add up. A million people in Tucson know it works. (back)

April 13, 2025   Star Tender 

There are stories of special people who take children on nighttime travels to the stars but I met a real Star Tender on the sidewalk in downtown Tucson, Arizona. Tall and silver-haired, Star Tender presides over the telescopes at the Sky Bar on 4th Avenue on Saturday nights.

Cars and streetcars rumble past while Star Tender opens a window to the heavens for anyone strolling by who wants to meet the stars. A group of young students, tourists with drinks in their hands, and couples walking by line up to take a peak through the telescopes. As each one looks there is a long silence. “Wow!” is the first involuntary word heard. Then the questions start. Some people want to know how the telescopes work, some wonder about distances or sizes or what a star is made of. Star Tender has the answers, for he’s been keeping company with the night sky for many years.

Star Tender tells stories of Jupiter’s bands of color, Saturn’s rings, craters on the Moon, and how the telescopes work. He has boxes of mysterious parts for the telescopes, computer screens showing pictures he’s taken of stars and planets, and stories about dark desert nights exploring the sky. 

Star Tender moves his telescopes back and forth, catching the beauty and mystery of our night sky for unsuspecting passersby.

And so on a busy downtown street in a big city the stars are brought to earth, giving people who take the time to look a little bit of the wonder that starry night skies have always brought to humans. 

Late in the night as the Sky Bar darkens and the streets empty, Star Tender carries his telescopes far into the dark desert hills to watch the stars in solitude but next Saturday he will return to bring the moon and stars back to 4th Avenue. (back)

April 6, 2025   The Schulman Telescope

After the tour of the Mt. Lemmon Observatory facility last week I also joined a group for star gazing after dark with the 32” Schulman Telescope. It was very cold up there! The dome the telescope lives in was opened to the sky, the ground was covered in snow and we were over 9,000’ in elevation.

The first star we looked at was the sun. Two telescopes with different filters showed flares, sunspots, and the pebbly surface of the sun. Then we stood at the western edge of the mountain to look for ‘green flash’, an uncommon optical effect seen at sunset or sunrise. That evening the sun gave us a perfect arc of bright green light with green rays on both sides of the sun just as it disappeared below the far mountains. 

Each telescope lives in a silo that looks similar to our grain silos. The roof slides open for viewing the sky. We looked at stars, planets and nebulae while hearing stories about using these big telescopes, information about the objects we were looking at and a few good jokes too.

Most of the group had not looked through a telescope before. The exclamations of “Wow!”  and a stream of questions came with every new object observed. Finally the telescope focused on the Orion Nebula. The mysterious world of bright glowing gas clouds filled with clusters of brilliant stars and layers of shadows was suddenly real to the viewers. 

Later, on the way down the mountain, many of the cars were stopped at lookout points, the people standing out under the clear night sky, looking one more time at the stars.

If you can still see a normal night sky with bright sparkling stars take time to go outside, look up, and enjoy the always amazing gift of a starry night.  (back)

March 31, 2025   Exploring Mt. Lemmon Observatory

A special opportunity was offered to me last week, a private tour of the Mt. Lemmon Observatory on the mountain above Tucson, Arizona. A long drive up the famously scenic road to 9,157 feet elevation took me from warm desert to snow and cold. 

At a locked gate I jumped into Joe Hoscheidt’s truck for the mile and half drive to the summit. Unlike the highway, there was no guardrail between the edge of this road and the thousands of feet of steep slope to the desert below. 

Joe is the Operations Supervisor for everything “from toilets to telescopes” at the Observatory. He and his crew take care of plumbing leaks and electrical problems, fix the telescopes and keep them running, maintain the buildings, the power plant, and telescope silos as well as keep the roads open year round.

I thought he would have a lot of engineering training but he’s a biologist “with a great crew”. Each staff person has multiple skills, sharing work when needed and each one loves their job. 

The power for the eleven telescopes is generated by huge old diesel turbines. There is a large machine shop, a room with computers from back in the day when astronomers actually looked through an eyepiece directly at the sky, as well as control rooms where telescope functions, scientist schedules, and maintenance schedules are managed.

Later in the evening guides opened the 32” Schulman telescope for a few hours of star gazing through the world’s largest telescope dedicated to astrophotography. Learning about what goes on behind the scenes to keep the telescopes working was an unforgettable experience and made me appreciate the privilege of being able to use this telescope. I’ll have more stories soon about what we saw that night. (back)

March 24, 2025   Mirror Lab Tour

This week we’re going on a tour of the University of Arizona’s Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab, where the largest telescope mirrors in the world are made. Hidden underneath the university stadium, the only location with enough electrical power for the kilns that form the mirrors, this lab works in collaboration with many other universities and seven countries.

Spin casting and a honeycomb form of mirror were developed here, making it possible to create much larger mirrors than with traditional casting methods. The mirrors are made of borosilicate glass which resists heat expansion. This lab can make mirrors up to 28 feet in diameter. Even with a honeycomb construction, a mirror this size weighs between 25 and 30 tons, but is 85 percent lighter than traditionally cast mirrors of similar size would be.

Each mirror takes four and a half to five years to make. Once a mirror is cast the glass is cooled for three months before more work can be done on it. At least thirty-five people work on the process of making a mirror in the lab.

The cooled mirror is polished by hand with very fine abrasives until it is smooth to one millionth of an inch. If a mirror were the size of the US, the largest irregularity in it would be one inch high. When finished the mirrors are encased in a special container, bolted to the inside structure of a ship and sailed to their destination.

The Mirror Lab has been making mirrors for the Giant Magellan Telescope since 2005, and will have the last mirror made by 2030. The telescope is being built on a mountain in Chile. The data from this telescope will be open sourced so anyone in the world can learn from and use the information it gathers. Go to giantmagellan.org to explore more of the story.  (back)