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The real issue is what is the definition of "amateur astronomer"
- have they looked through a telescope in the past 5 years, 1 year, month or week ?
- do they have a telescope ? What about ones who don't, but use other people's at observing nights ?
At least 1000, possibly 2000:
A) the numbers of members in astro societies between the Illawarra and northern Sydney - BTW where's the boundary - including blue mountains, Central Coast up to Newcastle ?
B) for each member of a society there's probably another family member - spouse or kids - sufficiently interested to count;
C) those who turn up at society observing nights, more than once, but aren't members;
D) then there are those who have been in societies long ago but no more (self included) but still go observing or maintain a fair level of interest.
My guess is this group is probably as large if not larger than the combined membership of societies.
E) then there are those we never hear about but bought a telescope. When I realised how many scopes Bintel and AstroOptics sold over the years it was fairly evident there must be quite a large number of people out there in this category. By way of example the numbers that turn up at the Macquarie uni open nights implies this group is large.
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