Don’t forget our next meeting is on Thursday, May 19, 2022. It will start at 6:30 PM to take advantage of the daylight. We will meet at Camp Brewster. See the post about the upcoming meeting May 19… for a Map. If we have bad weather we will set up the birds inside.

Raptors, Raptors, and More you ask? It’s me your humble president.

Fontenelle Forest Photo Display

Speaking of raptors, we changed out the photos displayed at the forest with the raptor photos. We did not have enough space for all. So we will put those photos on display after the ones on the racks have been on display for a month or so. Thanks to Jim and Andre Kuhn and Kathleen Crawford-Rose for their help in swapping out the pictures.

Milky Way

Hello FFPC members,

Phil has asked me to organize the astro-photography event with Ken Smith. Ken and I have discussed a few things in very general terms.

I will have a signup sheet at our May meeting this Thursday.
Please give some thought to the following:

– Possible event date(s) will be centered around the “New Moon” – nights with no moon.
IMPORTANT!  Participants must expect to be flexible on dates, as the weather will dictate if we will be able to shoot on a specific night.  Ken is a meteorologist, and will keep an eye on things for us.

Upcoming “New Moon” dates are Tuesday June 28th, and Thursday July 28th.  Ken has calculated 2 viable date ranges: June 26 to July 3rd (not Saturday July 2nd); and July 24th to August 1st (not Saturday July 30th).  Ken has church commitments on Sundays, which is why we don’t want to have an excursion late on Saturday night into early Sunday morning.

– We will be somewhere , far from civilization, late at night, in the dark, with no bathroom facilities.  Something to think about. 

We will need to arrive before sunset to get set up and organized.  Dark conditions will be around 10:30 or 11:00pm until 4:00 or 4:30am.  Ken thinks most people would be ready leave by 12:30 or 1:00am.

 – Ken does not have a set site where we can assemble a group.  
If YOU have friends or family in very rural NE or IA, within 2 hours or so of Bellevue, please consider contacting them.  Ken is willing to visit potential sites and scout them for suitability.  We will not go on private land without permission.  I will bring a Dark Sky map to the Thursday meeting if you want to take a look.

Here are links to Kens amazing photos and astro-photography presentation:

https://kensmithphotography.smugmug.com/Astrophotography/i-FC8tX4j
https://kensmithphotography.smugmug.com/Astrophotography-/


Thanks,
Brent Headley

Photo Contest

PHOTO CONTEST UPATE: Members  can send their digital copies for the competition anytime now.  Send them to ddturner2@cox.net.  Questions: 402-680-1186.

{the information sheet said that the copies should be sent starting May 25.  But anytime is okay.}

See you Thursday.

Donna T

There will be the “novice”, “advance”, and “anything goes” forms available.

It will have been two years since we have had actual photos turned in for the contest. Your photos should be FRAMED . This is different from the photos turned in to be displayed at the forest or the library. Please reference the contest rules .

Featured Image

Can you identify the bird, shown as the featured image for this post? Leave your guess in the comments below. The feature image is the picture shown at the bottom of the home page under “FROM BLOG“.

Lunar Eclipse

Did you get out to photograph the eclipse the other night? Send me some of your pictures and I will post them on the website. Send to webmaster