Mars

A NASA poster depicts the rover Curiosity on the Surface of Mars.

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Last week I was just one night off from the best view we will get of Mars. The perfect night had been overcast and the difference between the two nights would not be noticeable to me, so around 8 pm., I was braving zero degrees and crazy nighttime snowmobile traffic looking for our planetary neighbor. Mars was not too hard to find using a star chart and knowing that it would be in the eastern sky in the constellation, Gemini. Like other planets, it did not twinkle like a star and the reddish color for which Mars gets its nickname, the Red Planet, was reasonably obvious.

I started off using my binoculars and quickly discovered that they did not improve the view much. Not to worry though, my spotting scope is nearly five times more powerful and should make for a much closer viewing experience. Not. I was clearly under gunned, and Mars remained a small red circle in the middle of my field of view. Time to invest in a telescope.

The position of Mars right now is called opposition, meaning that it is on one side of the Earth while the sun is on the other side, hence opposite the sun. That makes it shine very clearly in the night sky. As a bonus, on January 12th Mars was at the aphelion position, or as close as it gets to the Earth, at 59.7 million miles. While the peak is over, both phenomena combine to make the viewing of Mars the best since 2022. Added to that, Mars, while not the brightest planet, will be visible from sunset to almost sunrise for a while.

If it is my job to alert you to things like this, then I failed, as opposition will not happen again until 2027. I did not catch on myself until after the full aphelion. Partially mitigating that fact, however, is that you can still see Mars better than normal for some time. In fact, on February 9, it will appear to rise from behind the crescent of a waxing moon, something that should look pretty cool. I hope to have a telescope by then or find a friend with one.

As another mitigation, I decided to learn a bit more about Mars and pass it on. We are not the first to call it, The Red Planet. Both the Romans and the Egyptians used equivalent names. The reason for the color is the iron in the surface soils. As this iron rusts, it turns red.

One way astronomers measure the universe is through astronomical units, AU. One AU is the distance from the sun to Earth. Mars is 1.5 AU’s from the sun. That means it gets a lot less solar energy. Also, with an atmosphere 100 times thinner than that of Earth, it has no “solar blanket” to retain the sun’s energy. It is dang cold on Mars, averaging about minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit (F), but can drop to minus 200 degrees F (the coldest temperature ever recorded on Earth is minus 128.6 degrees F). It is not even a place to go in Martian summer as the highest temperature is only 70 degrees F, yet at night can still drop to minus 100 degrees F.

Mars and Earth have a couple of things in common. Both rotate, with Mars taking 24.6 hours to complete a rotation while Earth takes 23.9 hours. Because Mars is about half the size of Earth, that means that it actually rotates more slowly, making it attractive to people with time management issues.

According to Space.com, “Mars’ axis of rotation is tilted 25 degrees with respect to the plane of its orbit around the Sun. This is another similarity with Earth, which has an axial tilt of 23.4 degrees.” While both planets orbit around the sun, it takes Mars 687 Earth-days to complete its longer journey, again favoring someone for whom time seems to fly on wings.

Mars is the most explored planet, and the only one with rovers prowling on the landscape. NASA has four rovers, United Arab Emirates and China each have one. We have learned a lot from these remotely operated machines including the fact that billions of years ago, Mars had a much warmer and wetter climate as evidenced by a 3,000-mile-long canyon three times deeper than the Grand Canyon. It has the largest volcano in the solar system, one whose base is the size of New Mexico and is three times taller than Mt. Everest.

Scientists continue to look for evidence that at some point in the past the fourth planet from the sun once supported life in some form, but it is doubtful that Mars will ever be habitable for humans. At least not this one.

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Help Idaho Wildlife

When we traveled across the state in October 2017, most of the vehicles we saw using the wildlife management areas did not have wildlife plates. Buying wildlife plates is a great way for non-hunters and hunters alike to support wildlife-based recreation like birding.

C'mon folks, let's help Idaho's wildlife by proudly buying and displaying a wildlife license plate on each of our vehicles! 

See below for information on Idaho plates. Most states have wildlife plates so if you live outside Idaho, check with your state's wildlife department or vehicle licensing division for availability of state wildlife plates where you live. 

And tell them that you heard about it from Nature-track.com!

Wildlife License Plates

Great news! as of 2024, there are three NEW designs for license plates. They still are bluebird, cutthroat trout and elk, but they are beautiful.

Idaho Wildlife license plates provide essential funding that benefits the great diversity of native plants and wildlife that are not hunted, fished or trapped—over 10,000 species or 98% of Idaho’s species diversity. Game species that share the same habitats (such as elk, deer, antelope, sage-grouse, salmon, trout) also benefit from these specialty plates.

No state tax dollars are provided for wildlife diversity, conservation education and recreation programs. Neither are any revenues from the sale of hunting or fishing licenses spent on nongame species. Instead, these species depend on direct donations, federal grants, fundraising initiatives—and the Idaho Wildlife license plates.

Both my vehicles have Bluebird Plates. I prefer the bluebird because the nongame program gets 70 percent of the money from bluebird plates, but only 60 percent of the money from elk and trout plates - 10 percent of the money from elk plates supports wildlife disease monitoring and testing programs (to benefit the livestock industry) and 10 percent from cutthroat plates supports non-motorized boat access.

Incidentally, in 2014, the Idaho Legislature denied the Department of Fish and Game the ability to add new plates or even to change the name of the elk and cutthroat plates (very specific) to wildlife and fish plates, a move that would have allowed for changing images occasionally and generating more revenue. It would seem that they believe that we Idahoans don't want a well funded wildlife program.

I think it is time we let the Legislature know that Idahoan support wildlife funding and that we would like to see these generic plates come to fruition.