Thread: Binos for bush stalking - do you need em? Why and how?

Originally Posted by cally woo

A lot of comments about slowing down. Hey how fast do you fellas usually travel 1km if bush stalking? Obv changes on sign etc but if you're in your "good" hunting spot, how far should a guy be going per hour?

years ago I got lent a GPS for the first time..I had been hard out bush stalking for 3 hours just mooching along carefully looking etc etc,got out GPS 750 mtrs from car!!!!! for sure I had traveled possibly 2kms around in around but still... today I will head out and intend to be back at car some 3-4-5 hours later..at no time will I be further than 2kms from car

It can be as slow as 200m an hour depending on vegetation, how close I come to some active @animals and if I bow hunt and want to make a shot with out being seen or if I rifle hunt , where an animal on alert that look at me can still fall under a bullet ( something I do not want with an arrow).

Regarding the use of binoculars, 1000’s of animals have been killed by experienced bush hunters who Nevers used them.

But I got taught to use binoculars during all my roe deer stalking years in Europe, and even in tight stuff they can be useful to pick up just part of a deer ( a leg, an ear or an antler…). When bowhunting they are a precious aid.

As to how fast you move….my ball park is when on sign, if I’m sweeting then I’m going to fast.

I had shot the occasional deer in the bush in the past, but I wouldn’t say that stalking had ever been particularly productive. Recently moving to using a pair of binoculars has changed how I feel about the prospects for this type of hunting. Previously I would mostly be making contact with deer at 15-20 metres, and at that distance the reds I hunt would almost always be onto me already. The ones that I did have an opportunity to shoot had seen me, but perhaps not also heard me, and maybe gave me a few extra seconds by wanting confirmation from that second sense. Binoculars have let me locate animals more routinely at the previously less likely distances out at 25-40 metres, and so far when I have done so, they haven’t in the main been immediately aware I'm there. With binoculars I’m averaging about 3 minutes from having spotted a deer in the bush to eventually taking the shot — completely different from my previous experiences.

For the OP: If this sounds like an approach you might like then binoculars could work for you. The stalking will be much the same as without the optics, pausing when new terrain comes into view or angles change, previously obscured corridors through the trees open up, so perhaps every 3-4 paces, but then using the binos to stretch out the search radius.
I spent about 18 months mulling over the likely requirements for such optics before purchasing and came up with the following preferences specific to bush stalking that have been borne out with use. I’ve given the reasoning behind each in the list below:

Light weight: < 500 grams. It isn’t just the effort needed to bring weightier binoculars from your chest up to your eyes and return them, a hundred times or so an hour; the moment of inertia of heavier glass can also fatigue the wrists. Such a weight limit restricts the objectives to 30mm. I’m not sure there are many if any 32mm candidates coming in at under half a kilogram, typically meaning a step up to 600-700grams.

Carry method: either a very short neck strap in an attempt to reduce the amount they can swing around, or a harness, in which case it may need to be customized to hold the smaller glass. The ideal might perhaps be a harness with a foam insert into which just the objective ends sit, more a cradle than bag. Pay to get this sorted given the likely number and frequency of removal / replacement cycles.

Wide field of view: reasonably well focused out to the edges at a given setting, since the vista being scanned will often be the full 180 degrees or more from each new position, rather than intently concentrating on a narrower field of observation. Ideally > 8°.

Magnification: secondary to field of view for this application in my opinion, so 7x or 8x, keeping the FOV large.

Focus: must be smooth and with little to no backlash, and robust too, as the focus mechanism is going to get a thrashing when regularly used in this application, and over a very limited portion of the adjustment range.

The quality of the optics is probably of secondary concern, in that I don’t think it will make the difference between seeing deer or not if they are present within the field of view. Nice glass is always nicer though.

A forgiving eye relief would be ideal given the frequency at which the binoculars are being brought back up for alignment with the eyes, but it is unlikely to ever be great with 30mm objectives, it is just that some smaller binos are particularly poor and so to be avoided I think for this reason. This can be worked around to some extent by familiarity with the particular binoculars — perhaps by developing the habit of knowing just where to align the cups with one’s eye sockets?

I’ll mention here a nice-to-have, and that might normally be considered an adverse outcome of the engineering tradeoffs made in the design of the optic; and that is a shallow depth of focus.
This was identified in one of the earlier posts. The unaided eye does not seem to be particularly good at focusing at more distant objects that are framed by closer surroundings. This is what you get when peering down through a corridor of visibility, and “peering” is the right word, as it requires a concerted effort to retain clarity at distance when there are closer distractions to the sides. All binoculars will blur out the near-field to an extent when used to look past foreground objects, but those with a particularly shallow depth of focus will do this better. It will be possible to set the focus up for 25-35 metres and then pan across the surroundings, pausing each time the image “snaps” into focus, indicating a gap in the vegetation and a view hopefully into new territory.

There are however aspects that may need to be added to this list or traded off if the binoculars are also going to share some tops or slip use along with the bush stalking, as it is unlikely that two pair of binoculars would be carried each for a specialized task, more probably just the one pair carried for the planned main activity that will then be pressed into service for the other. Two candidates worth considering are the Nikon M7 8x30, and the Swaro Companion 8x30. I use the older Monarch7 8x30 model that was replaced last year with what appear to be the same optical design with perhaps just upgraded coatings to justify the price increase. The poor light control these have (glare) has not been an issue for me in this application.