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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Question for birders. (1 Viewer)

B

black crow

Well-known member
Do you think this would be a good idea?

Carry a regular 7 or 8x bino. (32 to 50mm) on a harness and then in a side pouch with a easy to access magnetic clip or something similar hold a 10x25-28mm bino. Both of these would be of very good quality.

This to me seems like a good idea because you have power options you'd lack with just one full size 8x or 10x.

What say you? Any major downsides to this?
 
Tried this: 7x42 Leica Ultravid BR and Leica 10x25 Ultravid. Problem was in those (difficult) situations that I needed the extra mag the 10x25 was not at its best. In gloomy or windy situations I struggled with the small exit pupil and when it was cold it was no fun fumbling with the little bin with gloves on.

Then I tried a Nikon 10x42 SE as a complement and found I kept on looking through the Nikon... So eventually I sold the 7x42.

With 7X I often wished for more magnification. Not so with 8x. Maybe just get a good 8/8.5X?

Or perhaps a 10x30/32 would be better alongside your 7x42. A 10x30 IS would be interesting.

George
 
yeah 10x30 or a light 10x32 like the Zeiss Terra 8x32 ED MC?

Those are good points however. I do have a pair of Bushnell 10x25 that I can use with light gloves very easily. Those are really a wonderful little bino for a tiny bit o money IMO. However if it was really cold and the gloves were medium weight they likely wouldn't work very well.

I like the 30 mm idea. Who makes a really good one? The Nikon Monarch 10x30 gets mixed reviews.
 
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Long ago I carried, for a while, a Nikon EII 8x30 and a Canon IS 12x36. A nice combination but a bit bulky. I don't know if Leica Duovids are made anymore, I've never seen one.
 
the concept is workable but downsides
-weight
-cost of 2
-getting the straps tangled or one banging into the other

I use the leica 10 +15x50 for this which greatly increases weight and cost issues for
-shorebirds
-raptors
-usually 10x but sometimes crank up to 15 for more detail or distance
in hindsight the lighter 8+12x42 may be better

B&H has both as special order

edj
 
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Have you considered the Leica Duovid?

Another option is to use a doubler monocular, if you can find one that fits your eyepiece and binoculars.
 
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This would seem attractive and give you magnification choices but small objectives don't give easily usable exit pupils though very light, pocket binos don't give you much 'real estate' for your hands to get comfortable and steadily hold them.

Personally I would choose between 8x and 10x depending on the habitat and just take the one pair. Leica's Duovid might be attractive to you but it comes with weight and field of view penalties for example the 42mm Duo weighs 37 ozs (over a kg) and the fields of view at the two magnifications are:
118 m/90 m
351 ft/268 ft

Lee
 
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I have both 8x and 10x 32 and that's what I use. Works fine for my needs. I was just thinking about a friend who wants to own a 10x42 but I'm not sure they will end up using a 10x for birding. I think they'll go back to their 8x for various reasons and then be stuck with a large 10x they'll never carry. So I was trying to come up with something for them where they could have 10x for very occasional spotting.
 
I use 10X42 and 16X70, but I bird from my car and have a rest available by partially raising the window.
 
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Well I'm going to give it a try myself and see how it works. I'll bet it will work for me. I'm pretty adaptable and can often make less than ideal conditions work well. Zen 7x36 on a harness and Bushnell Legend 10 x 25 on the side or in a pocket. One reason I think it will work for me is I've used that 10x25 a lot and it's really easy to look though. They did an excellent job on that little guy.
 
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I don't think the magnification difference between 8x and 10x is enough to make it worthwhile to carry both.

In some situations (e.g. a route that I regularly hiked that had a few overlooks that occasionally yielded very distant views of potentially good birds), I have found some use for an eyepiece doubler. Normally, if distant viewing is useful on a regular basis, I carry a scope. The difference between 8x and 10x is trivial, whereas 30x is a nice step up.

--AP
 
Yeah maybe. I also have a little 12x compact that is good optically but not as eye friendly. I can easily carry that instead of the 10x. I do serious hiking so a scope is not going to happen for me but might work for my friend. I'll mention that to her.
 
black crow said:
...I do serious hiking so a scope is not going to happen for me...
Click to expand...

If you had many situations in which to use it, I bet you could find room for a Nikon 27x50ED straight, or a Celestron 7-22x50 Hummingbird (and perhaps switch the bulky zoom eyepiece to a fixed ~25x to reduce size and weight), and maybe even a Velbon 355 tripod with small ballhead (rather than the heavy bulky head it ships with) to support the scope. It's the rare occasion when I can't fit a small scope and tripod in/on my pack. Only not worth taking when they aren't necessary.

--AP
 
Maybe but I'm getting old and my knees have had two surgeries and I try not to even carry a pack when I absolutely don't have to. In summer I have to carry water for myself and two dogs. I don't want much else. Plus I really don't enjoy mono viewing compared to binoculars. I do have one good spotting scope but I haven't used it in a long time.
 
black crow said:
Maybe but I'm getting old and my knees have had two surgeries and I try not to even carry a pack when I absolutely don't have to. In summer I have to carry water for myself and two dogs. I don't want much else. Plus I really don't enjoy mono viewing compared to binoculars. I do have one good spotting scope but I haven't used it in a long time.
Click to expand...

I am the opposite, and prefer the benefits of binocular viewing. The additional signal processing in the brain makes a tremendous difference, at least for me.

I obviously can't look with anyone else's eyes.
 
Alexis Powell said:
I don't think the magnification difference between 8x and 10x is enough to make it worthwhile to carry both.
--AP
Click to expand...

This would be my position. At this point I only carry 8x bins in the field, but there are definitely times where I wish I had 10x. I can't think of any time where this small increase in magnification would've been worth carrying a second pair of bins, however.

If I'm going birding in a spot where there might be distant birds that demand an ID I won't be able to get with bins alone and I can't justify dragging my scope along (long hikes, etc.), my solution is typically to bring my DSLR with 150-600mm lens. The views through the optical viewfinder are worse than binoculars, but if you can often zoom in on a photo and get an ID, even just using the screen on the back of the camera. Not as good as my 30x eyepiece on my scope, but maybe equivalent to 20x?
 
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