Thread: Hand held thermal now legal on public land

Originally Posted by Waitati Hunter

I'm surprised there was a rule against it to begin with since all you can do with a handheld device is look at the deer.

You have completely missed the point of why they were banned.
I was simply a public safety issue

Day or night you would pick up a hot spot and maybe assume it was your target species.
Clearly at night you were not allowed to shoot no mater what systems you were using.

But during the day it would be very easy to assume it was your target species. Move in to a shooting position and use a conventional scope or sights to find and shoot the target.
Which might not have been your intended target species.
Humans have a wonderful ability to see what they want to see even when it is something entirely different !

I think over time as this technology has become better understood and more widely used in pest control and culling programs that the policy makers at DoC have moved to this more enlightened position.
They would have been getting feedback from their own people in the field that thermals actually make it safer and easier to positively identify the target and non target species.
All this dependent on the skills and experience of the operator, the quality of the thermal and the conditions it its being used in.

I have used a high end hand held thermal for around 10 years now for work and play.
And believe me all units and all operators are not equal.
I can see just a tiny pixel at 2km that others people and units can't.
I have had stints of using it every night for three months week on and week off.
So I have clocked up huge hours doing conservation work using the thermal to find and identify the target species and then put myself into position to intercept them and shoot with conventional sights.