[astro_south (Andrew)]

I like the idea of a "What's good this month" section with some advice on what can be seen with different apertures. Some of this data is available on the web and in books. Another way to gather this data is to set certain test objects for the month, "Challenge Objects" if you like, that the keen people can go out and observe and then report back on in some detail. Better than a photo (which could be miss-leading and hard to match to the eyepice view) would be sketches of the objects noting the aperture and magnification used for the sketch and possibly the sky conditions (seeing, LVM, etc if appropriate). You don't have to be an artist to do this - its just dots and smudges. This sort of activity will hone our observing skills. The Challenge objects (I'm thinking of 3 to 5 objects here for the month) could also be the target for astrophotographers as well and results could be compared and questions could revolve around the differeing techniques and what works best. The 3 to 5 objects would have to be judiciously chosen to allow everyone to participate - for example at least 1 object taylored to (but not limited to) binocular views.

I don't see this as a specialised forum either, rather a thread in the "Space and Astronomy Talk" forum each month that lists the targets, gives some advice and then the replies can be observations and discussions targeted at the listed objects.

....and hey, if its not your cup of tea - don't worry...its not compulsary.

These are just some quick thoughts, though if you want I could put some more thought into this with a view of giving it a test run.