If you have a stargazing fan on your gift list there are a lot of choices.
I recommend buying online from one of the major telescope brands, such as Orion and Celestron. Go to their websites and you’ll find many choices in types price range and information that’ll help you buy the right scope.
The are three basic kinds of scopes: refractors, reflectors and Cassegrains.
Refractors are what more people think of when it comes to telescopes. The light from whatever you’re viewing comes in one end of the telescope through what’s called an objective lens and you view from the other end of the scope through the eyepiece.
With refractor telescopes, the wider the objective lens the better. Refractor scopes are sold by the diameter of their objective lenses. You need at least a 60mm refractor. Anything smaller is basically a toy.
Reflector telescopes gather light with a concave parabolic mirror in the back of the scope that bounces the reflected image to the front of the scope where another flat mirror directs the image to an eyepiece on the side.
The wider the mirror the more light you can gather. All reflector telescopes are sold by the diameter of these mirrors in inches. You really need at least a 6-inch reflector for serious backyard stargazing.
Reflector telescopes are my favorites, especially reflector telescope in Dobsonian mounts, better known as Dobsonian or Dob scopes. If you’re strictly interested in a good quality image and you don’t mind scopes that are a little bigger and bulkier, go with a Dobsonian. My biggest Dob is a 20 inch and I love it.
A Cassegrain type is more or less a hybrid of reflector and refractor telescopes. They tend to be more expensive because they’re more portable and generally have more bells and whistles.
For kids under 10 years old I recommend the Orion SkyScanner 100mm TableTop Reflector. It costs about $100 and is easy for kids to use: not too big or too small.
For older kids and adults just getting into amateur astronomy I have two recommendations: The Celestron 80LCM computerized refractor telescope is the less expensive scope, about $300. It’s a portable, with an 80mm objective lens and a fully computerized hand-controller with huge database that really helps the user locate hard-to-find targets.
On the higher end for an intermediate scope my best recommendation is an Orion brand SkyQuest XT8i Computerized IntelliScope. You can buy it from Orion for about $530. It’s an 8-inch Dobsonian scope with a computerized celestial object locator.
If you want to go a step higher, get an Orion SkyQuest XT8g GoTo Dobsonian Telescope for about $850. It’s the same 8-inch Orion Dob, but has a “go to” motor set up that actually slews the telescope to whatever celestial object you punch up on the computer. Once it finds your target it’ll track it across the sky.
To make sure your astronomical giftee knows his or her way around the night sky, get them a good astronomy stargazing book: “Nightwatch” by Terrence Dickinson, “David Levy’s Guide to the Night Sky,” or, I suggest with all humility, “Mike Lynch’s Washington Starwatch.” Look on www.voyageurpress.com.
The best software I’ve seen is “Starry Night Enthusiast 6.3.” Order it on www.starrynight.com/.
There’s also star map software on iPads that allows you to hold up your iPad in any direction of the night sky and it’ll diagram stars and constellations. There are similer apps for smart phones like Google Sky.
Mike Lynch is an astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and is author of the book, “Washington Starwatch,” available at bookstores. Check his website, www.lynchandthestars.com.
The Everett Astronomical Society: www.everettastro.org/.
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