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Greg,
Looks like it is the H-alpha shell associated with the NGC6231 + Scorpius OB1 complex, that remarkable concentration of superluminous OB stars that we were discussing as being the hypothetical source of energy for the giant dust chimney in your MW image that stretched far above the galactic plane.
If I remember right, it is called Gum 55 and also RCW 113, but I don't really know if Gum and Rodgers+ Campbell+Whiteoak had the same outline for the object.
The combination of depth and high resolution in good amateur nebular imaging is surely competitive with the images in the H-alpha surveys done by professional astronomers. I discussed this fact once with the Sidonio, when it seemed that he had picked up vast areas of diffuse H-alpha that was not even associated with any particular object. (about 50 percent of the H-alpha emission from some galaxies is simply extremely-faint diffuse emission)
Sorry to say that I don't see any celestial canids here....but then again I have absolutely no imagination, and I never see animals or people in the sky!! (the best I can manage is to see squares and triangles.....)
I have a really nice scientific overview of this entire region (cluster+ OB association + nebula), but as is usual with scientific papers, the file size limit stops me from attaching it.
cheers,
Robert
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