My Notes: These notes are identical to M82 since they are generally captured in the same field of view. M81 and M82 are neighbors. Both are spiral galaxies. M81 is face on from our view and M82, called the cigar galaxy, is a side view. M81 is about 3 times as large as M82. They are both about 11.8 million light years away and had a "recent" encounter that caused M82 to turn into a starburst galaxy which means it is producing stars up to 33x more quickly than normal galaxies.

Photographed on March 5th 2021. I took this at the Prairie Astronomy Club’s Star Party Location located near Cortland, NE. Temp was 35℉ captured from 20:18 to 22:13. I used the exact same setup as M42, Fujifilm XT4, 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 lens with 1.4x teleconverter, same flimsy tripod and ball head, dew shield, etc. However, perhaps due to skill or more patience, I got my focus extremely accurate and had very little shake in the setup. I was able to stack 40 images with a rating of .85 or higher to form this image. That’s the most I’ve ever been able to stack and the highest minimum rating I’ve used. I had 4 that were perfect 1.00 rated images.

It was a clear night, but by 22:00 the more experienced members said the sky was getting hazy. I saw it was in the horizon, but wasn’t able to discern it higher in the sky with my naked eye, but I took their word for it and ended my night with them. I’m very pleased with how M81 and M82 turned out and the level of detail I was able to capture.

Bode Notes: (No. 17, Dec. 31st 1774) ‘A nebulous patch, more or less round, with a dense nucleus in the middle.’

Messier Notes: (Feb 9th, 1781) ‘A nebula near the ear of the Great Bear, on the parallel of the star d. of 4th or 5th mag. Its position determined from that star. This nebula is a little oval, the centre clear and can be seen well in an ordinary telescope of 3.5 feet. It was discovered by M. Bode at Berlin on Dec. 31st, 1774 and by M. Méchain in Aug. 1779.’