Despite all the clouds, rain, thunderstorms, and tornados, I did observe three more Hickson compact galaxy groups over the past month. They have been entered onto the Galaxy Groups and Clusters page.
Hickson 36 is pretty dim and I could only see two of the four galaxies listed for this group at magnitudes 14.5 for IC528 and 16.0 for P25791.
Hickson 37 was a little better with NGC 2783 at least being a direct vision object. I was able to pick up three of five galaxies listed for this one. Magnitudes ranged from 13.0 for N2738 to 16.2 for P26006. I was only just able to get a glimpse or two of the dim stellar nucleus of P26006.
I was more successful with Hickson 51, observing five out of seven galaxies. The five I could see actually formed a parallelogram very similar in shape to the constellation of Lyra the lyre. The magnitudes of galaxies I could see ranged from 13.9 for NGC 3651 (direct vision) to 15.3 for IC2759.
These were all viewed from my home in western Tennessee with my 18″ Obsession.
