Hi everyone,
Last evening I was out for a relaxed observing session using my Tak FS128, under very good conditions in rural skies. As NGC 4565 was nearly overhead at the time and it is one of my favorite galaxies, I natuarally spent some time on it. Well, the major surprise was not 4565 itself (which was glorious as usual), but NGC 4562 (or 4565A as some sources call it), the faint galaxy at the end of the curving line of 11 and 12th mag stars to the west of 4565. I was not looking for it, as I did not expect to see it in the 128, having failed to detect it before in my 6" and 5" achromatic refractors. Yet, there it was, faint but umistakeable, easy with averted vision, and after covering my head with my DSA hood, held steady even with direct vision. It was a major surprise, as most sources list this galaxy as anywhere from 13 to 14th magnitude, and, although under relatively dark skies, I was far from observing under really dark conditions (my backyard SQM readings hover around 21.0).
NGC 4562 is an easy catch of course using my 18", but according to my notes I failed to detect it with my old 12" (of course I was less experienced then). A quick search indicated very few observations, and all of them with 12 or more inches, with the single exception of O' Meara's observation using a 4" in his Caldwell book. Has anyone else observed this galaxy in a smaller aperture? I will post a sketch tomorrow as I have yet to digitize my drawing.
