Don Machholz of Colfax, CA found his 11th comet on the morning of Tuesday, March 23rd. What sets Don's 11 discoveries apart from the other comets found recently is the way it was found. Nowadays comets are found by computers analysing thousands of digital images. Only after the computers have sorted through the data is there human intervention to confirm that the object being flagged as a comet is really a comet. Don, on the other hand, has found all 11 of his comets the old-fashioned way. With no help from computers or digital cameras, Don finds his comet by peering through his telescope and identifying faint fuzzies that shouldn't be there. In fact, it is the first visual discovery of a comet since late 2006. Read more
Comet C/2010 F4 (Machholz) was discovered at magnitude 11.7 by D. Machholz (California). The comet reaches perihelion on the 10th April 2010, at a perihelion distance of 0.58698 AU.