The period towards near the end of July has long been one of my favourites of the year to observe meteors.  There is always a wide variety of meteors visible especially after midnight.  The Southern Delta Aquariids reach a broad peak, the slow moving Capricornids are active, the swift Perseids are ramping up, and there’s a bunch of other minor showers adding up to the overall counts.  On this night, the various cloud model forecasts showed that the sky would clear up near 1am with very good transparency, just as the Moon set.  I decided to venture out to Westmeath Lookout, a beautiful elevated site located north-west of Cobden.  When I got there, the sky was still more than half cloudy.  I saw a number of meteors in the clear patches so I could tell the activity was quite good.  Unfortunately, the wind seemed to have changed direction and the cloud cover persisted at this location.  I knew I’d have zero luck if I stayed put. It appeared a bit clearer further north into Quebec, so I jumped in the car and drove another 20 minutes until I found a spot on the side of a quite farm road with an open view of the sky.

My effort only marginally paid off and all was not lost.  It was on and off clouds until 3:30am EDT when it finally cleared enough (with 20% clouds) to observe formally for an hour.  During that hour, I saw 14 meteors (7 South delta Aquariids, 1 anthelion, 1 July Pegasid, 1 Perseid, 1 eta Eridanid and 3 sporadics).  The best meteor was a nice mag 0 Eta Eridanid that shot degrees and left a one second train.  It was not all that quiet out there : )  The cows moo’ed non stop, echoing through the fields, and occasional distant flashes and “thump” sounds of artillery fire exercises at CFB Petawawa were heard.

Observation July 28/29 2020, 07:30-08:30 UT (03:30-04:30 EDT)
Location: Chapeau, Quebec, Canada
(45.9795° -77.1145°)

Observed showers:
July gamma Draconids (GDR) – 18:37 (279) +50
alpha Capricornids (CAP) – 20:07 (302) -10
Anthelion (ANT) – 21:04 (316) -17
North delta Aquariids (NDA) – 22:00 (330) -05
South delta Aquariids (SDA) – 22:26 (337) -18
July Pegasids (JPE) – 00:04 (001) +15
Perseids (PER) – 01:29 (022) +53
eta Eridanids (ERI) – 02:01 (030) -17
49 Andromedids (FAN) – 02:07 (032) +50
phi Piscids (PPS) – 02:33 (038) +33
psi Cassiopeiids (PCA) – 02:54 (043) +75
July chi Arietids (JXA) – 03:12 (048) +13

07:30-08:30 UT (03:30-04:30 EDT); cirro-cumulus clouds; 3/5 trans; F 1.14; LM 6.16; facing S60 deg; teff 1.00 hr
SDA: seven: +2; +3(3); +4(3)
ANT: one: +3
JPE: one: +5
PER: one: +5
ERI: one: 0
Sporadics: three: +1; +2; +5
Total meteors: Fourteen

Clear skies,

Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario