[John W (John Wilkinson)]

Southern beehive cluster in Carina.
Single exposure image taken thru a 10" LX600 SCT scope (alt az) with a Canon 1200d camera.
John Herschel described the cluster as “a really superb object”, and noted a bright orange star dominated the cluster (there are actually two orange stars embedded in NGC 2516 (also C96), so it’s not clear which one Herschel was referring to). Herschel counted more than 200 stars in the cluster; modern estimates put membership at 103 stars, including the two orange-red star of magnitude 5 and 6. Most of the stars are concentrated in a circle of 20-30′ (recall the full moon is 30′ across). The cluster is about 1300 light years from Earth, and the light you see now left these stars when the Mayan civilization was flourishing in Central America.