7 replies to this topic

[Sofee12]

Does anyone have any stories or experiences of animals moving or toppling their Seestar s50 while they've been away letting the Seestar run??  I would imagine dogs and cats would be a real problem.  There's a family of skunk's living under the neighbors shed which is fairly close to my location for my Dob and Seestar.  Last night they came out while I was checking on the Seestar and sky conditions.  It had me a little concerned.  In the winter, deer often come into the yard as well.  I suppose a small temporary fence would help.  Looking forward to reading of your experiences!

[SgrB2]

I have a roll-off-roof observatory and use a
motion-sensing toy duck that runs on a 9 volt
battery with an off/on switch. When I leave
the observatory for the night, I switch the
duck to on so that if any critters get in,
the duck starts up and I can hear it from
inside my home on a baby monitor. It would
for sure scare a deer away.

Edited by SgrB2, 19 June 2025 - 11:27 AM.

[sevenofnine]

Putting your Seestar on a much sturdier photo tripod should eliminate any problems with animals. I put mine on a Manfrotto befree advanced and it works great! 

 

https://www.bhphotov...vel_tripod.html.

[rkaufmann87]

When I set mine up in the back yard it sits on a foldable card table I got at Costco some years ago. It's folds up to ½ the width of a normal card table and fits in the car easily when I travel.

 

I live in suburbia but we still get cats, skunks on occasion, raccoons, possum and wild turkeys but the turkeys roost at night. 

Edited by rkaufmann87, 19 June 2025 - 05:52 PM.

[jprideaux]

I mainly worry about neighborhood dogs peeing on a low-to-the-ground telescope.  

since the SeeStar came-out with equatorial mode, I usually use mine on a larger tripod that can better handle a wedge and that gets it farther off the ground so I don't worry about neighborhood dogs as much.

[Daiserina]

 

Not my Seestar, but a muskrat was very interested in my Starblast.

[lsjones]

I'm more concerned about neighborhood cleptos than cats, dogs, etc.

[davidgmd]

Put a few mothballs around it.