BinocularsBlog – Advice on Digital, Waterproof, & Compact Binoculars for Bird Watching, Sports, Astronomy, Night Vision, & more!

One of the things I stress with my bird watching beginners is to always look with the binocular and never assume that little bird down the trail or up in a tree is the same species they have been seeing all day. Doesn't take long to show them why. That little drab bird you see without the binocular often becomes a wonderfully colored bird with the binocular. Optics is not just about magnification, optics is also about seeing color. A birding binocular is a prime example. That rich blue of an Indigo Bunting, for instance, sometimes appears as gray and colorless to the unaided eye under certain light conditions. Get the Indigo in your bino and it takes your breath away. Indeed, more subtly colored birds, such as the Palm Warbler rarely, if ever, reveal their color to the unaided eye, even when only a matter of several yards distance. Next time you see that little brown bird you've been seeing all day, check it out in the binocular. You may be in for a surprise.

New moon this last week and for me that means time for the astronomy binoculars. That's the good news. The bad news is no clear sky, so far, so patience is in order. My favorite astronomy binocular target for spring? Really tough to beat the Beehive on a spring evening in a good astronomy binocular. The view is not as brilliant as the Pleiades in my Nikon 10x70 Astroluxe, but the Beehive has an understated, elegant charm and it certainly fills more of the sky. When sitting on the patio with my binocular trained on the Beehive I can't help but remember darker skies back on the prairie when I could just glimpse this famous open star cluster without a binocular. Still, it is comforting just to see it at all with all my Chicago light pollution.

I know the weather in this area too well to proclaim that spring is here and no more snow, but all the birds are telling me that it is, indeed, spring. The Robins are singing up a storm every morning, long before most humans are awake. I hear the sounds of migrating birds at night as I sit on my patio doing astronomy with my astronomy binocular or telescope. For birds, this is the time to scramble and get that family going. For birders like me, it is definitely time to put all other activites on the backburner, grab the binocular and get outdoors. From now until things calm a bit in the summer months, the birds are moving and even a matter of a day or two can make a difference as to what a bird watcher sees or does not see. Spring is THE big event in the birding community, so dust off that birding binocular and enjoy!

One of the most appealing things about bird watching for me is the unexpected and new - no matter how many times you've seen a bird, it can still do something you haven't seen, before. That's yet another reason for every birder to have that birding binocular at the ready. I ALWAYS carry a binocular and it paid off this last Sunday. I was riding my bike though a section of woods when my raptor radar went off and, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the familiar outline of a Cooper's Hawk, only not up in a tree where I usually see it, but down on the ground, standing in water, of all things, back in the flooded timber. I quickly pulled up my Leica BL 10x25 binocular and took a closer look. I could see almost every feather on the hawk, but I observed no evidence of feeding activity in the usual cloud of feathers that erupts when a Cooper's feeds on a songbird. Still, the Coopers did not appear in a hurry to leave - it was obviously intent on something, even to the point of tolerating my nearby presence, but why was it standing in the water? Seeing that I made it nervous, though, I slowly lowered my binocular and then quietly continued on down the trail, leaving this great hawk to its work, whatever it was. I could research an answer, later.

Happy to say, I found a possible answer on the Cornell All About Birds website, today. According to the Cornell birding site, this songbird hunter has been known to hold a songbird under water until it ceases to struggle, since the Cooper's, unlike a falcon, does not bite its prey to kill it. That formidable bill on a Coopers' is a feeding tool, not a hunting tool.

I am a sucker for new editions of my favorite birding guides. Every time a new edition of the Sibley, Geographic or Peterson's hits the shelf, I have to have it. Not sure why, but it works out, nicely, since I usually have the old edition tattered and worn by then. I suspect it is because I love the artwork, that's why all my guides use illustrations, rather than pictures. I keep my old birding guides, of course, and still have my first Peterson's to this day, a '47 edition if I remember, correctly. I am a bit less sentimental bout my birding binoculars and tend to sell one to buy another, but birding field guides I keep. No one would want one of my old birding guides, anyway, as I am fairly liberal when it comes to marking them up with notes and so on. Kind of fun, though, to pull an old birding guide off the bookshelf and thumb through it to see what I wrote so many years, ago. Makes for a very pleasant birding trip down memory lane.

Birders and other folks closely in tune with the natural world get a bonus with a free calendar. No, not the type of calendar you get by sending money or ordering from a website. It's a calendar you get from seeing the seasons change in front of your eyes by the birds you see in your birding binoculars. Earlier this week was a great example. On my way home from work, I pedaled by a small lake and had the pleasure of watching a male Northern Shoveler (a duck) in my Nikon Premier LX10x25 binocular. I would have known it was March, even if I had never looked at a calendar this year. You never see a male Shoveler in full breeding plumage in the fall when they migrate through and March is typically when I see this species of duck. Also, the Shovelers told me it was St. Patricks Day, as well. How? They were wearing green, of course.

Do binocular harnesses really work? They sure do! A bino harness make the biggest difference with full size binoculars, but I have even used a binocular harness to good effect with mid-sized, 30mm or 32mm binoculars. Amazing how much better it feels to take that 20 plus ounces off your neck with something like the Nikon Prostaff Binocular Harness or the Eagle Optics Binocular Strap Harness. I don't always use a harness, of course, but when I have an all day birding session planned, I grab a birding binocular equipped with a harness. A binocular harness is not the height of fashion, but a bino harness is a girl's or a guy's best friend after a long day in the field with a binocular. They do work.

When I started birding more years ago than I care to admit, roof prism binoculars were the new kid on the block and porro prism binoculars ruled the market. How things have changed! With the demise of the great Nikon Premier SE, now discontinued by Nikon, the serious birding world is down to a few lone porro prism birding binocular holdouts like the Swift Audubon 820 and, perhaps, the lesser known Minox BP. What a shame, since a quality porro prism is such a wonderful binocular to use for birding. My Nikon Premier 8x32 SE is still the brightest 8x32 I have used and one that the fussiest birder would love for its razor sharp optics. Oh, well, times change and so does the binocular market. Not exactly a shortage of great birding binoculars out there, even though the vast majority of them are now roof prism binoculars.

The birds are on the move! Aah, music to my ears as it is for any passionate birder. This weekend, my compact Leica Ultravid 10x25 Bl binocular got a workout. Waterfowl in good variety have been arriving all week and that is a welcome change from seeing Mallards, only, all winter. The weekend turned up Buffleheads, Red-breasted Mergansers, Redheads, Greater and Lesser Scaup, a Ruddy or two and, a first for me on this suburban lake, a Goldeneye. On the songbird front, our winter birds are now being joined with migrating and summer resident species. Interesting to see newly arrived Song Sparrows and Savannah Sparrows in the same location as our wintering Juncos and Tree Sparrows. A report from friends back home in central Nebraska, tells me the Sandhill Cranes are there in great numbers, as is usual for mid-March. If it wasn't such a long bike ride, I'd grab my spotting scope and see it for myself.

I haven't had a chance to use the Swarovski Snapshot adapter which allows you to attach a small digital point and shoot camera to a Swarovski binocular to do some impromptu digiscoping, but I like the idea. I have done some digiscoping with a binocular over the years by holding a digital point and shoot camera over the eyepiece of a binocular. Does this work? Yes, I've managed some great pics when digiscoping with a binocular, but it does take some patience and practice. Biggest issue, as with all high magnification photography is stability - pretty tough to steady things enough for a sharp pic, even at a binocular magnification of 8x, but it's also something of a challenge in terms of coordination when you are trying to hold both a camera and binocular at the same time. That's the idea behind the Swarovski Snapshot adapter. It's a real a headache saver. Thank-you Swarovski.

Maybe it's the woman in me, but I am a sucker for boutique brands of binoculars and, when given a choice, I will even go with a boutique model option when offered in a binocular. My two favorites in this category are the Leica Ultravid BL binocular and the Swarovski Crystal Pocket binocular. Sure, I could have gone with the more practical armoring on the Leica by selecting the BR version, but just something about that classic leather covering of the BL that makes me drool. It is pure class in an already very classy compact binocular. Elegance is the word I use to describe my Swarovski Crystal Nabucco binocular. I was already a fan of Swarovski crystal, anyway, so to get a Swarovski binocular with Swarovski crystal imbedded in the body was just too much. I may wear jeans to the opera, but when it comes to binoculars, I'll be the best dressed gal, there, with my Swarovski Crystal.

My lake is finally open, so it is time to grab the binocular and scan it for incoming waterfowl. That's the good news. The bad news, this weekend, was the two days of torrential rain, so never got a chance to do much birding. Not really complaining, though. The air has that "spring" feel to it and the cardinals and some robins are starting to sing in the early morning darkness as I pedal to work. As much as I appreciate winter for my cross country skiing, I am more than happy to change gears, so to speak, and get going on my spring birding. If you are an avid birder, you know what spring means. My magic number on warbler species this year is twenty. Joanie and her birding binoculars are ready. Come on, migration!

I've been in the Chicago area suburbs going on five years, now, and I still find it hard to believe that so few people I encounter understand why I typically wear a binocular around my neck. When I explain that I am a birder (birdwatcher) some of them still don't understand. They've never heard of anyone who does something like that. Truly makes me feel like a stranger in a strange land at times. Now, if I was down in the city, things might actually be different - there is an active birding community in the Chicago parks near the lake, largely centered on those great birding hotspots along the lake shore. Up here, in the suburbs, though, birders are spread much thinner. I pretty much know every birder in the surrounding communities and that is but a handful of people. If birds of a feather, flock together, be nice to find a bigger flock. Birding, for me, is always more fun when I can share it. Grab your binocular and join me.

So many people I know like to grumble about the month of February. "It's such a dreary month" … "will winter never end?" … "maybe it's time to move to Florida" … on and on and on. For sure, February can be dreary, but that hasn't stopped me from enjoying it. In fact, this last february was one of my best, ever. Didn't get a lot of snow, so my bicycling was a breeze and what snow we did get was almost perfect for my corss country skiing. My astronomy binoculars got a great workout and we added Comet Lulin to the list. My birding binoculars also got a good workout, with some great up close and personal encounters with several raptors. Me, move south? Never. On to March.

Very little bird activity over the weekend, what with the recent cold snap and high winds, though I did give it my birding best by carring my Leica 10x25BL binocular around my neck as I bicycled around the area to do some errands. This has been a bit colder winter, overall, to be sure - we still have ice on area lakes. Like most birders, I am getting a bit of "cabin fever" and am more than ready for the annual spring bird migration to begin. I blame my impatience on the cardinals - they have been singing every morning. Okay, just kidding, I get teary eyed every time I hear a cardinal sing. Will be nice, though, to see some other birds. Joanie is ready

When giant astronomy binoculars first hit the market in any numbers, we had quite a selection in terms of astronomy binocular size. Over the years, though, the market has pretty much trimmed down the selection, based, of course on sales. Today, astronomy binocular sales are overwhelmingly for 20x80 binoculars or for 25x100 binoculars, with a smattering of 10x70 binoculars and 15x70 binoculars. One of the sizes that has pretty much gone by the wayside is in a giant binocular is the 11x80. That makes me a bit sad, since an 11x80 was my first giant binocular and it really opened my eyes, so to speak, as to what a giant binocular could do. From a dark sky site with that old 11x80 binocular, I logged many a faint galaxy and nebula. Of course, my current 10x70 astronomy binocular would no doubt do as well, but I have nothing but fond memories of that 11x80. It held its own against some much more expensive binoculars. Wish I still had it.