This week’s photograph was taken by Thomas Russell, who captured an eye-catching green comet as it flew through the night sky for the first time in 50,000 years. Thomas was able to capture this amazing, once-in-a-lifetime image from his front garden in Harrogate.

Comet C/2022 E3(ZTF) by Thomas Russell

Photo of the Week celebrates the Harrogate district. It could be anything from family life to capturing the district’s beauty. We are interested in amateur and professional photographs, in a landscape format.

Send your photographs to letters@thestrayferret.co.uk for a chance to be featured next week, we reserve the right to adjust and crop images to fit into our format.

In his garden in Harrogate, James Clark looks through a telescope to millions of light years away, almost all the way back to the start of the universe.

He explains why astronomy fires his passion:

“It’s the wonder of the universe and how small we puny humans are I suppose, it makes you realise how irrelevant we are.”

Now retired, Mr Clark grew up on Star Trek and even had Professor Steven Hawking as a lecturer when he studied maths at Cambridge University.

He’s only been stargazing for a year but has already captured an impressive line-up of planets, nebulae and galaxies through his telescope.

He said:

“I’ve never done any photography before but I’ve always been interested in physics. I realised the quality of picture you can get from your back garden as the technology has developed to such an extent. Once I started I was hooked.”

The Whirlpool Galaxy

As well as studying the stars from his garden, he enjoys packing up his equipment and heading out to a remote spot far, far away in the outer reaches of the Harrogate district.

His favourite place is Thruscross Reservoir car park due to its pitch black skies. He said:

“Astronomy is really great for mental health and communing with nature.

“Sitting outside listening to the wild animals and spotting the occasional meteor in a dark sky is just heaven.”

Saturn and Jupiter. Credit – James Clark

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Mr Clark has been inspired by Nasa’s James Webb Space Telescope, which cost billions of dollars and has recently started to beam back lustrous images from space back to earth.

But he said technology for the amateur astronomer is now relatively affordable. He uses the same software as that at Nasa, bought for just a couple of hundred pounds.

“My favourite picture is of the Whirlpool Galaxy, 30 million light years away. We’ve had some printed up and have a few around the house.”

The Moon. Credit – James Clark

He started out using a cheap Canon DSLR but since upgraded to a telescope that cost over a thousand pounds. To help him develop his skills, he interacts with an active community of “astros” on Twitter who support each other.

With so much time spent looking up at the stars, he said he sometimes ponders the age-old question of whether we are really all alone whilst we float in space.

“Absolutely I believe that we are not the only intelligent life out there.”

Whilst most of us are dreading the shorter days and longer nights that come with winter, the budding astronomer is looking forward to being able to spend more time in the darkness, exploring the endless expanse.

The Squid Nebulae. Credit – James Clark