Choose Quality Optics

My vision is fairly good in my right eye after  nine surgeries on it and another nine on my left eye but when rain or snow slants down  over the tag alders, and if a deer stands motionless back in this thick cover, they can be very tough for anyone to see.

Or, if I'm brown trout fishing in late June or early July, a pair of quality binoculars can help me spot brown trout rolling on the surface of Lake Michigan several hundred yards away. One thing for sportsmen to remember is that optics aren't just for hunters; they work equally as well for boaters and fishermen, although under vastly different circumstances.

Quality optics means everything to a boater, bear or deer hunter, caribou or elk hunter, or any type of boating fisherman. The difference between good and bad optics is like the difference between a good apple and one filled with worms. When shopping for binoculars, rifle scope or a spotting scope, buy the best glass you can afford. If you can, ramp it up just a bit more until the wife starts screaming at you. Spend money, and buy quality.

I've always believed in good optics, and also believe that you get what you are willing to pay for. I have a pair of Swarovski binoculars, and I'd rather leave home without my bow release or my favorite fishing hat than without my binoculars. In fact, I usually have a pair in each car.

Quality binoculars aren't cheap, but most things of quarity are not.

I know I can still shoot a bow with my fingers and make a killing shot, but I don't have the same confidence in my vision without quality glass. It can literally mean the difference between my shooting or not shooting, or in picking a hole through heavy cover.

I own a number of different binoculars, and all are made by leaders in the field. I own Bausch & Lomb, Bushnell, Nikon, Simmons, Swarovski and several others of somewhat lesser quality. I've got all the binoculars I need, and you can buy quality binoculars for $300. Yoou can by top-of-the-line binoculars for more than $1,000. If you can spend that much money on binoculars, go for it and buy the best there is. You won't be making a mistake.

Take for instance the last day of my 2009 turkey season. The sky was dark and overcast, the woods were dark, and two gobblers came to me after shooting time began. Both were in full strut, both were fanned out and gobbling, but I didn't know if they were longbeards.

The problem was it was still too dark in the woods for my shotgun scope to allow me to see a beard on either bird at 25 yards. The law says we can shoot only a bearded bird. Even though both birds were gobbling and strutting, I couldn't see a beard so I didn't shoot. My binoculars cut through the early-morning murk and reveealed them to be two-inch jakes. I passed.

Travel, talking to other hunters, and studying their gear can often help you choose quality binoculars.

A friend of mine returned to Michigan many years ago from a hunt in southern Alabama. He and his wife were hunting with some Louisiana Cajun shrimpers from the Mississippi River delta area, and they all carried big, heavy binoculars and rifle scopes with large objective lenses.

"What's up with the big binoculars," my buddy asked one Cajun hunter. He was quickly given a demonstation of the difference between his optics and theirs.

"Our binoculars give us 15 minutes more quality hunting time once your binoculars no longer work," he said, once shooting time had ended. "Look yonder. Can you see that deer standing 10 yards inside the cover by that lightning-blasted pine stump?"

My friend couldn't see the animal. The Cajun offered his Swarovski binoculars, and my friend quickly spotted the buck. That short demonstration offered him more light-gathering qualities, greater magnification and a much better ability to see deeper into the brush.

Quality optics can help hunters find a shooting hole in thick cover.

Alabama is wrapped up with deer, but once they get into thick cover along the edge of the green fields or a palmetto thicket, they are invisible without great optics.

Before the turkey season opens, I travel the roads and watch birds fly up to roost. My Bushnell spotting scope with a window mount enables me to find which trees are being used by gobblers.

My ability to see deer enables me to better plan on how to hunt them and when to take a shot. In some cases, it means allowing the bucks to come to you; in other situations, it may allow the hunter to make tactical changes in how he hunts that animal.

Binoculars and a spotting scope make scouting big September bucks from our roads far more effective.

It goes without saying that seeing bear, deer, elk and other critters before they see you is of paramount importance. Quality optics can help make that happen. For instance, early in the 2009 bow season  I saw some leaves rustling in the tag alders.

I wondered why that was happening because there was no wind. I studied the area from a window in my house, and it took several minutes but then a doe came into sharp focus. I kept studying the arimal, and her fawn stepped out, all nice and pretty with some white spots dotting its sides, indicating it was a late-born fawn.

Another time, some years ago, I was trolling Lake Michigan for brown trout without any success. Soon some herring gulls began diving into the water a quarter-mile ahead of the boat.

I grabbed my binocularsm and studied the water around the gulls, and soon spotted the rolling, feeding fish 100 yards away.

The lines were set as I trolled around the edge of the boiling cauldron of feeding fish. My boat was well past the fish when the first brown trout hit, and it jumped. I reeled in the other line while my fish took more  line. I bent to the task of fighting that brown trout, and soon landed it.

My knot was checked, and I turned the boat around, let out my lines again. Five minutes later I just skirted the edge of the school of browns that were feeding on alewives, and had another jarring strike. That fish weighed 14 pounds, and I quickly caught another brown trout before the school of fish broke up and headed for deep water.

That was a great case of being prepared for any eventuality. It pays to buy good optics, and it also pays to learn how to use them. They often play an important role in my fishing and hunting activities, and they can help you too.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors