10x30mm Canon IS (3/28/19 - Tasmania): moderately bright, large, a few stars resolved over the hazy glow of unresolved stars. Picked up 0.5° W of mag 3.2 N Vela.

Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille discovered IC 2488 = Lac III-4 = D 330 between 1751-1752 using a 1/2-inch telescope at 8x during his expedition to the Cape of Good Hope. James Dunlop described D 330 as "A faint cluster of small stars of mixed magnitude, with two or three pretty bright stars in it. This answers to 485 Argus (Bode) and is described as a small star surrounded by a nebula." Solon Bailey also found the cluster on a photographic plate in 1896 using a 1" f/13 Cook lens at Arequipa station. The discovery was reported in "A Catalogue of Bright Clusters and Nebulae" (Annals of Harvard College Observatory, Vol LX, No. VIII). As John Herschel never observed the cluster it wasn't included in his GC or the NGC. Dreyer only credited Bailey with the discovery in the IC.

600/800mm - 24" (4/10/08 - Magellan Observatory, Australia): very large, very bright cluster at 84x but fairly scattered. The most striking portion are two bright ~N-S strings of stars, each ~5' in length, on the SE side of the cluster. These two strings are connected on the north end by a couple of stars forming a "U" outline. Many of the other stars are also arranged in strings including streams of stars that extend to the NW on both the north and south side of the cluster. The most prominent string starts at the northern end of the western row and extends NW to a mag 9.4 star. The outline of the cluster then meanders south on the west side before heading back SE towards the two parallel strings. Although the listed diameter is 70', my description applies to the central 15' portion of the cluster. Located 30' W of mag 3.1 N Velorum. The irregular planetary, NGC 2899, lies 51' N.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb