March 2017 - Picture of the Month
The Needle Galaxy (NGC 4565) in Coma Berenices
I think that this is a beautiful galaxy, but what's more important is that it's not only visible to imagers and those with huge telescopes. You can find it with small scopes, and Owen claims that the dark lane is potentially visible for those using 8 inches of aperture and more.
If you feel you're lacking a proper challenge, as David pointed out in his email comments below...
This LRGB image reveals the dark dust lanes of the edge on spiral arms partly obscuring the bulge of the core. NGC 4565 is approximately 40 million light years away and is thought to be a barred spiral galaxy 100,000 light years across, similar in size to the Milky Way. Several other galaxies can be seen in this image including NGC 4562 to the lower right.
... there's more hidden in this field to hunt down with cameras and large dobsonians.
James Whinfrey - Website Administrator.