[1][2] Built in 2000, the observatory had a Meade LX200R 14" Schmidt-Cassegrain F/10 telescope, purchased and on loan from Ohio State University Astronomy Dept.

Farm Cove Observatory took part in cataclysmic variable star (CV) research for the Center for Backyard Astrophysics and was also known as CBA Pakuranga.

In April 2004 Farm Cove Observatory joined the MicroFUN collaboration [2] headed by Professor Andrew Gould at Ohio State University.

The mission of MicroFUN is to obtain intense photometric monitoring of high magnification gravitational microlensing events in the hope of detecting planets orbiting the lensing star.

FCO had been contributing unfiltered magnitude measures to the British Astronomical Association campaign on Blazar OJ+287.