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Message: <blockquote data-quote="tjsimonsen" data-source="post: 1371666" data-attributes="member: 38764">Good for you. However, I still wouldn't advice the OP to go that way. If he doesn't have a good scope already he would need to spend a lot of money on one to start with. Second: I have been in a lot of situations where a scope would have been too much to drag around (on a boat, in the forest, desert, mountains etc.), but my Rebel XT and EF100-400 got me the pictures (but a 200mm wouldn't). Third: I know people who been using both scope and longer lenses, according to them the former cannot compare to the latter with respect to IQ.Finally, though 1500mm focal length may sound attractive, I'm not sure it always is. If I was to take a picture of a bird in the prairies or the desert on a warm summer's day at "ideal' distance with 1500mm, there would be so much atmospheric distortions between the scope and the bird that the result would be horrible. 400mm would force me to get closer (hopefully not so close that I would scare the bird away, but it is a danger) and thus reduce the distortions considerably. 200mm would force me to get so close that I most certainly would scare the bird away.Thomas</blockquote>