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

Since we are moving into a traditional holiday, this weekend, with Memorial Day, it has me thinking of some binocular traditions and how some of them came to be. Not that I expect to change anything, but I do wonder why we have such traditions.

Why, for instance, does Hollywood still, to this very day, show a screen with two partial circles to depict the view when someone is looking through a binocular, when anyone who has ever used a binocular knows that is not correct? Of course, it is unrealistic to expect Hollywood to portray real life, but you would think one of the many people on a movie set would know better. Surely, some of those folks have binoculars of their own

As an expert in binocular sales for so many years, I still have to wonder why so many people walked up to the sales counter and picked up a binocular and looked through it, backwards, often exclaiming that optics were very good or, in some cases, asking for a binocular with more power. On the other hand, I have to admit that, when I did show them how to use the binocular, they were all good sports, each and every one, and we all got a good laugh. Binocular sales can be fun.

Last, but not least, why do so many binocular manufacturers still package those cheesy, useless lens cloths with there low end model binoculars? Have they ever tried to actual clean a lens with them? Most of them I have seen actually tend to make things worse and smudge the lens. At the price of a real lens cloth, such as the Nikon lens cleaner, you would think that they could supply a product that actually works.

How many people own binoculars? I don’t think there has ever been a “binocular poll” as such, but I would have to guess that, in this country, there are probably as many households with binoculars than households without binoculars. Why else would the binocular manufacturers make so many binocular models and so many different types of binoculars? Indeed, the binocular market is a very active and competitive place.

This, of course, is good for business, but it can also make it a bit tough when you want to buy a binocular. How do you choose from the literally hundreds of binoculars available? If you are lucky enough to actually live near a store that carries a large selection of binoculars (a true rarity, these days) and actually find a salesperson who knows anything about binoculars (rarer, still), you have half the battle won. Unfortunately, such a store and such knowledgeable salespeople are becoming ever scarcer, so most of us are on our won when buying a binocular and that usually means buying online.

The good news is that there are some excellent websites for buying optics and perhaps no website has more informative articles on buying and choosing all types of optics than OpticsPlanet. I know, because I wrote most of the how to buy guides and articles for OpticsPlanet on binoculars, spotting scopes and telescopes. Working for OpticsPlanet has been one of the finest and most rewarding work experiences of my life and, now that I am retired, I stay in the game with OP by writing these blogs and answering questions on the OP discussion forum. I suspect I will never stop writing about binoculars, too.

One of the features of the home we just bought in northern Wisconsin, as our permanent retirement home, is its large screened porch. To folks who have never been to the north woods, this may not seem like a big deal, but it would only take one summer night, up north, to change their mind. When you hear that ominous hum just about the time the sun goes down, you only have a few minutes to seek sanctuary from hordes of invading and very aggressive mosquitoes. Without that porch, you have to spend those otherwise beautiful northern summer nights indoors and that is a real shame. A screened porch is also a great place to eat meals and escape black flies during the day.

On a less ominous note, a good porch allows you to watch wildlife along the lake or on your property, so, lately, I have been thinking about a rugged and user-friendly binocular to use from our porch for guests. Since the viewing will be all moderate and long distance, an individual focus binocular would be ideal. Such an observation binocular should also be rugged enough to survive a drop or two. This “porch binocular “ should also offer plenty of image brightness and enough magnification for those longer distances, but not so much as to need a tripod.

My first pick as my porch and guest binocular is a Fujinon 10x50 Polaris F-SX. It would be a great pick for anyone who has a view of a lake and does not want the inconvenience of a tripod. Optics and construction, as with all Fujinon binocular, are superb. Also good as a deck binocular is the Steiner 10x50 Military-Marine. If a 10x binocular is just not enough magnification for you and you still do not want the hassle of a tripod, an image-stabilized binocular, such as the Nikon Stabileyes 14x40, is a great alternative.

I have a grandson with a birthday coming up and my step daughter was thinking about a kids binocular, rather than a standard, more expensive binocular. You see, Luke is a typical eight year old in that he sometimes gets so excited and adventurous that he might just leave his binocular, behind, on one of his local expeditions to the back yard or neighborhood park. If you have kids or grand kids, you know the type.

Kids binoculars do need to be a bit smaller in size, too, for a youngster to properly handle and I also like a low magnification for ease of use. That means keep the first and second numbers on the lower side. Prices are also typically low in binoculars marketed as a child’s binocular, since there is a good chance the binocular will get lost. I’m not sold on this idea of a “disposable” binocular, since you really do take a hit on performance, quality and durability, but I can understand the reasoning from a parent’s point of view. The Carson Hawk 5x30 is a good example of this kind of binocular. The Carson Hawk 5x30 has the right combination of size and magnification and the price certainly makes it a typical kids binocular. On the other hand, if you have a child that is more mature for their age and are not afraid to spend a bit more, a Leupold Yosemite 6x30 would be a great choice with much better optics and quality and will be a binocular a child is likely to have for many years with a little bit of care.

My spring warbler migration is over, but I still carry my binoculars every time I step out of doors. Call it habit or maybe I am hoping to pick up a straggler, but I just can’t bear to leave the house without a binocular. Since I usually carry compact binoculars, such as my Leica Ultravid 10x25BL, this is hardly any real inconvenience, though I suppose I get my share of looks when I walk into a store with binoculars around my neck. Actually, birding and binoculars are such a part of my daily routine that I wonder why all those other people aren’t carry binoculars, too. Don’t they know what great birdwatching they have right in their own neighborhood?

Unfortunately, so many of them don’t. I suspect this lack of interest in the natural world around us is just a symptom of our ever growing urban and suburban landscape and I also realize that most people aren’t as connected to nature as I am. Obviously, it would be unfair of me to be critical of others because they don’t feel the same way I do. Still, this cultural/spiritual gap sometimes makes me feel like a stranger in a strange land. I sometimes ask myself what I am doing in such a place.

In the meantime, as I walk across a parking lot to my car, my eyes wander to the skies as I search for a raptor or other interesting bird, overhead. You can take a girl away from her favorite birdwatching spots, but you can’t take the bird watching out of the girl.

Summertime is a great time to do astronomy with a binocular, though, in truth, any time of the year is a great time to some binocular astronomy. Maybe I am just a little sentimental about summertime astronomy, though, since summer is when I first started astronomy and that was with a binocular or maybe it’s just that user-friendly binoculars are a better fit for those warm, lazy summer nights than a more difficult to use telescopes. Whatever the reason, summer, to me, means using an astronomy binocular and every time I pick up the astronomy binocular, forty years of memories flood through my mind. May it always be so.

The first place a newbie to astronomy should start is with a binocular is the immense star fields of Sagittarius, though if you live as far north as I do, now, that constellation never gets very high in the sky. Still, any binocular, even a conventional birding binocular or marine binocular will show you breathtaking vistas in that part of the sky. In fact, the work actually begins when you try to isolate and actually name all the many objects you can see with a binocular in the southern sky on a summer night, especially if you are fortunate to live far from the city lights and under a dark sky. If you are a newcomer to astronomy and already own a conventional binocular, take your binocular out and scan the southern part of the sky on the next clear, moonless night. You won’t be disappointed.

How often do you clean your binoculars? That is a question I get, now and then, from folks who just purchased a new and expensive binocular and want to make it last or, in some cases, they are a little nervous about getting their binocular dirty and not sure what to do about cleaning. Wouldn’t it be nice, though, if a binocular stayed as clean as the day you first take it from the box? Unfortunately, binoculars will get dirty, no matter how careful you are. Anytime a lens is exposed to open air, it’s going to collect dust, at least.

I’m old school when it comes to cleaning binocular lenses and that actually means clean as little as possible. That comes as a surprise to some people, but every time you touch a lens surface with even a lens cloth, lens tissue, lens pen and so on, you risk a scratch on the lens or, more likely, damaging the more fragile lens coatings. The good news is that modern lens coatings are much more durable than the lens coatings of even ten years, ago, but unless a lens is really dusty or dirty, I believe in hands off. I shudder when I see some binocular owners pull out a lens cloth on a nearly hourly basis to remove every smudge and speck of dust from their binocular lenses, even though that tiny amount of fouling is absolutely insignificant and impossible to see when you look through a binocular. In truth, it takes of lot of dirt, dust, smudging to really reduce optical performance and only then do I clean a binocular.

What do I use? I use a lenspen and it really doesn’t make any difference as to brand – they are all basically the same product, just different labels. I like the Carson lenspens, especially the mini version for those really small compact binocular lenses, but any brand will do. Lens pens are cheap and when they no longer do a good job, just replace them. I prefer a lenspen to a lens cloth simply because they do a better job of cleaning at the edges of a lens, especially eyepiece lenses, than a lens cloth and they do a better job of removing smudges. Lens cloths are really better suited to larger lenses, such as spotting scope objective lenses. Lens pens also incorporate a lens brush which I consider essential to first remove grit from the lens surface before any cleaning job. That’s something you don’t get with a lens cloth.

Most backyards have a fairly predictable assortment of birds that come to the feeder, depending on the region, of course, and our yard gets its share of “regulars", too. On the other hand, our yard is a bit different in that it also gets visits from birds not so typical of a back yard and that makes it a birdwatching delight. The only explanation I can offer for this is that we are located across the street from a large tract of urban forest (we are very fortunate). For sure, I always have a birding binocular within reach, whether working in the kitchen or writing at my desk and I also have a spotting scope set up for some digiscoping when birds are nice enough to pose for a picture. Thank heavens, our home has a lot of windows to the back yard.

Yesterday morning I spotted a Common Yellowthroat in our bushes. This is a bird of thickets and overgrown, brushy areas, so maybe that says something about the state of our back yard, though I prefer to think of our yard as lush, rather than overgrown. This is a bird that is more often seen than heard, because of the thick habitat it prefers, but if that Common Yellowthroat just wants to sing and not be seen, that is fine with me.

Last week, I saw several Nashville Warblers in our ash trees. Again, these are not your typical back yard, suburban birds. The Nashville Warbler is more of a forest bird, but, more than once, this last week, I have grabbed the binoculars and stepped out on the patio to confirm the species of warbler I saw in our ash trees. Any warbler that wants to stop in the backyard for a visit is just fine by me.

And, of course, there was that Indigo Bunting, a couple of weeks, ago. When I think of all the hours I have spent out in various nature preserves and likely Indigo Bunting spots and then to have one in my back yard. That’s birding for you. Birds don’t follow the rules.

That’s just fine with me, too.

When you look at a boutique binocular, such the Swarovski Crystal Pocket binocular, you tend to see something that would be right at home at the opera, and, in fact, that is one of the reasons I bought my Nabucco version of the Swarovski Crystal series, several years, ago. It is truly an elegant compact binocular and, guys, if you are looking for that gift for the gal in your life, this would be a great gift and great statement. Like all Swarovski binoculars, this Swarovski compact just oozes quality and elegance; it has a heft and feel in the hand quite unlike any other compact binocular I own and I own the best when it comes to compact binoculars.

However, it is still a Swarovski Pocket binocular underneath the glitter and that means anything but a fragile flower of a binocular. I use my Nabucco same as I do any of the other compact binocular I own and that translates into a lot of birding and a ton of trail work. The Swarovski Crystals in the Nabucco are so well embedded that I have never had cause to worry about damage to the exterior of the binocular, yet. To be sure, my Swarovski Crystal is as much at home in the woods as it is the opera and, in fact, I have received a lot of nice compliments on it when I use it at birdwatching events.

When it comes time for the opera and formal evening wear, though, there is nothing like a Swarovski Crystal binocular for a necklace.

Haven’t picked up any new warbler species, lately, to add to my 2010 birding list, but I really don’t mind. It’s just such a great time to be out on the trails with my binoculars and digital cameras. How could I possibly want more in terms of beauty than the woods and fields in May?

Nevertheless, May is also an important month for a birder or bird watcher. The first half of May is a very serious time for birding, since the warbler and song bird migration is in full swing. The second half of May sees a decline in the song bird migration and the start of the summer birdwatching season.

Yes, there is a difference between birding and birdwatching, though the two terms overlap and are commonly interchanged. No need to worry about being technically correct on this one.

When we say “birding” we are usually talking about trying to see and identify as many different bird species as we can in an outing and when the “action” slows, we move on to another area. Birders typically keep lists of the bird species they have seen and, in fact, may keep separate lists based on locale, year, month and so on. The name of the game in birding is to see as many different species as you can and birders tend to be the more intense and serious folks when it comes to observing birds. Birders are also the most likely to spend the big bucks on premium birding binoculars and spotting scopes and are often willing to travel great distances and spend a lot of money to see birds they can add to one of their lists. I have been a birder for more than forty years.

When we say birdwatching, we usually mean just watching birds at hand and enjoying them in a much less hurried way. Bird watchers tend to be a more casual group and typically have favorite birds they like to see and are less concerned with keeping a list. A great example of bird watching is simply watching birds at your feeder, every day. They may be the same birds, but the fun is observing the way the birds interact and the differences in how they feed and what they prefer to eat. Indeed, a good bird feeder can keep you entertained for hours at a time. I have also been a bird watcher for over forty years.

In truth, every one of my trips includes good portions of both.

The warbler activity in my area of Milwaukee is definitely tapering off. The last few days, a lot of work scanning and stopping in my best birdwatching spots has only produced a handful of warblers in the binoculars. I will, of course, continue to make my daily birding run on the bike, birding binoculars around my neck, but I suspect the big warbler push may be over. We’ll see.

There is more to birding, of course, than warblers and this has been a good week for bird species other than warblers. Saw my first Great Crested Flycatcher and Indigo Bunting of the spring, yesterday and I am also seeing more Wood Ducks, Baltimore Orioles and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks. To be sure, there is always something to see when you are bird watching, not to mention all the health benefits of getting outdoors, every day and I’m having a blast riding the bike.

Can’t help but be curious, though, as to how the birding in our new home, up in Rhinelander, will compare to what I have now. Milwaukee has been very good to me for the birding it has provided, compliments of the excellent Milwaukee trail system in my neighborhood, but the Rhinelander area will provide a different mix of habitats and that means a different mix of birds. I am especially interested in all the lakes and marshes in the Rhinelander area – something I don’t see, locally, here in Milwaukee and, hopefully, that means the spotting scope will see more action. In the meantime, I have more birding to do, right here in Milwaukee.

It is May, but our weather has been anything but what most folks would describe as typical May weather. It has been colder and much wetter than what we had in April, but since when has a little weather ever stopped me from doing anything outdoors? Good thing, too, because I will be moving to a place where winter comes, early, stays late and dominates for more months than not, or, at least, I hope it does. My cross country skis are waxed and ready to go.

Okay, it is only May and I am already looking forward to winter. This attitude mystifies many folks, but, believe it or not, winter up north is eagerly anticipated for all the winter sports it provides. Winter is not something to be dreaded and avoided as it is in more southerly regions. Attitudes are different up north when it comes to winter.

In the meantime, summer is on the way and I do have a lot of other things to keep me busy. Birding, this week, has slowed a bit, with all the rain and cooler temps, but I still go biking and birdwatching, every day, and I also carry my birding binoculars at all times, even out to the mailbox. Warblers are still in the area and can show up at any time in some unexpected locations. There are flash flood warnings out, today, but unless the trail is covered with too much water, I will brave the rain in search of more warblers. When the weather clears, I will also pack some digital cameras on my rides in hopes of getting some spring wildflower pics. Did I mention that we also bought a small kayak? I need to find a convenient local spot to run it though its paces. Then there is all the fishing and let’s not forget my telescopes and my astronomy, which I also do in the winter.

Yup, plenty to do until winter arrives.

Just when you think you’ve seen it all …, well, you really haven’t. That’s birdwatching to a T and after forty plus years of watching birds, they still surprise me, at times. To be sure, it is always a mistake to assume anything when you have a birding binocular, in hand, or are sitting behind a spotting scope to keep an eye on the birds. Birds don’t read field guides and they often stumble into places they are not “supposed” to be, according to the published information. Yesterday was a good example. I thought I knew what birds to expect and what birds not to expect at my feeder, then a new bird shows up for a few minutes and my nice orderly little mental world is set on its ear.

I was at my desk, just for a moment, to collect one of my digital cameras, before I headed out on the bike to do some birding. I just happened to look through the patio doors and saw a small sparrow sized bird working the bushes that just seemed different, somehow. It didn’t sit like a sparrow and it wasn’t moving like a sparrow, but neither was it moving like a warbler. What gives? I knew better than to ignore this feeling, so I raised my binoculars and was a bit puzzled to see a bird with splotchy blue all over its body. From experience, I always check the bill, first, when identifying an unknown bird and, sure enough, this was no sparrow or warbler. The bill gave it away. It triggered some of the past sighting I have seen of this bird and the other members of its family.

I now have a first spring Indigo Bunting male to add to the bird list I keep for my yard. The Indigo Bunting is more of an open clearing bird you typically find along forest or brushy edges, but this one decided to check out my suburban back yard, perhaps because he was young and inexperienced or just curious. Who knows why? He is certainly welcome to stop back, though, for another look.

Have to get back to watching my yard with my binoculars. Never know who will show up, next.

I’ve been birding almost every day this past week, on the bike trail, despite the cool temps and the rain. The birds are certainly on the move and each day brings new species to add to my 2010 birdwatching list. My binoculars have gotten quite a workout and I am right on pace as far as numbers of birds seen up to this point in the year. Yesterday, for instance, I added a Golden-winged Warbler, a Blue-winged Warbler and a Magnolia Warbler to my list before the wind started to howl and I called it quits. It's hard enough to pick out warblers with the birding binoculars amongst all the leaves when conditions are calm.

Have to say, though, that the weather seems to be more of an issue for me than the birds.

On a couple of days, I dressed as I normally would for a cool weather ride on the bicycle and learned the hard way that I had underdressed. I wasn’t bike riding so much as I was birding and birding is anything but an aerobic workout. It means moving along, slowly, with frequent stops for sometimes as much as a half hour. If you are using a spotting scope for your birding, you tend to move around even less. You normally don’t work up a lot of sweat when birding or birdwatching, at least not in southern Wisconsin.

So, with temps holding in the 40s and a breezy wind out of the north, I wasn’t exactly toasty warm. In fact, I had to pump hard on the bike to work up enough body heat to avoid hypothermia. This is not the picture we paint in our minds when we think of spring and the month of May, but cool weather is cool weather, regardless of what the calendar says. Next time, I pack along some cold weather gear.

Every bird species that visits your bird feeder has their own way of doing things and seeing these differences in their behavior is just one of the many things that makes feeding birds so much fun. Birdwatching via your bird feeder gives you a peek into the lives of birds live that you often don’t get from birdwatching in the field and that is one reason why you always find a birding binocular on my kitchen table. My Chickadees, for instance, dart in and grab one sunflower seed at a time, then dart back out to finish the morsel on a nearby perch. They rarely sit on the feeder for more than a second or two. My new arrivals, my Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, are real hogs, by comparison; the grosbeaks pretty much park themselves on the feeder and have at it. They don’t leave until they’ve had their fill. Morning Doves and most of my sparrows tend to stay on the ground and collect what has spilled down from the feeders, above, but you can observe for years before you will catch a Downy, Hairy or Red-bellied Woodpecker on the ground below the feeder.

Some birds, such as my Cardinals and Red-bellied Woodpeckers, don’t put up with a lot of crowding when they feed and they’re big enough to make it stick. Other birds like feeding in larger groups. One of my favorite sights at my bird feeders is a finch feeder packed with Goldfinches. These little guys have no problem sharing a feeder with their buddies and sometimes will occupy every perch my finch feeder has to offer. In fact, if you want to see more Goldfinches at a time on a finch feeder, buy the largest finch feeder you can. I’ve had feeders with over a dozen of these brilliant yellow birds at one time. That is quite a sight. That is why I also keep a digital camera on my kitchen table with the binocular and the spotting scope parked nearby to get the close ups you see in my pics.

The annual May spring warbler migration is a big event in the life of a serious birder. When you hit it just right, the trees seem to be alive with warblers; if you don’t, better luck, next spring, because you only have a narrow window of opportunity, typically two weeks or so and, in some bad weather years, that shrinks to a matter of only days. Being in the right place at the right time with your birding binocular is the golden rule if you want to add a lot of warbler species to your annual bird list.

Wednesday, for instance, was not a good warbler day along my bike trail, despite the warm weather. I waited in all my most likely warbler spots and scanned again and again with my birding binoculars, but the best I could do was one Yellow Warbler and several flocks of Palm Warblers. Not complaining, mind you, because I did see my first Baltimore Oriole of the season and more Scarlet Tanagers.

Yesterday (Thursday) did not look promising, either – the weather was sharply colder and I feared the cool temps would slow the insect activity and so limit the warbler activity. On the other hand, some of my best warbler days, in the past, have been on miserably cold May days. As it turns out, Thursday was another one of those days better days for birdwatching, after all.

I hadn’t gone 100 yards on the same bike trail I used on Wednesday, when I spotted a Pine Warbler with my Leica Ultravid and by the time I made it to the end of the trail, four miles, later, I had added a Tennessee Warbler, several Nashville Warblers, a Northern Parula, a Yellow Warbler, a Chestnut-sided Warbler, a Yellow-rumped Warbler, a Blackburnian Warbler, more Palm Warblers, many Black-and-White Warblers, an American Redstart, and a fair number of Northern Waterthrush. Also saw my first Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and Veery for the year, between warbler sightings.

Now, twelve warblers is not my best warbler day (my best is still eighteen), but I’ll take it; it sure beats the two I scored for the day, before and twelve warbler species is still a good day of birdwatching in my book. Interestingly enough, I hardly saw a warbler on the way back on home on the same trail and it wasn’t for lack of trying, either. Where did they go? That’s spring warbler action for you.

I started birding in a serious way back in the 60’s, but, even to this day, it still surprises me when an unexpected bird pops into view. Where did you come from, I wonder? That element of surprise is truly one of the great attractions of birding and birdwatching. You can sit for days and months with a birding binocular or sitting behind a birding spotting scope and see the same birds, day after day and then it all changes in an instant.

At the moment, I am sitting at my kitchen table with my laptop, binoculars at the ready, and just happen to glance out my window for at least the millionth time. I spot a sparrow under the same bushes where I have been seeing sparrows all winter. Even without my binoculars, I can see that the bird has a prominently striped white crown. Okay, probably another White-throated Sparrow; that would make White-throated Sparrow sighting 1000+ these month, alone. But wait! I have been birding long enough to ALWAYS take a look and ALWAYS confirm before claiming a species, so I raise the binocular and, surprise, not a White-throated Sparrow, but a close cousin, the White-crowned Sparrow. That pink bill is a dead giveaway. I have been expecting to see White-crowned Sparrows come though for quite some time, but it still comes as a surprise to just pick up my birding binoculars and just see one, at last, simple as that.

Of course, each time I am rewarded in this fashion, I am reinforced to keep looking and looking and looking …

I’ve been birding on a daily basis for so long that it really unsettles me when I miss a day. If I don’t get out and check on the birds, who will? In fact, it’s getting to the point that I feel naked when there is not a birding binocular around my neck. I have even begun to choose my clothes to wear for the day based on how they will look with my binocular. Oh, yeah, I have a serious case of birdwatching fever.

It’s not like this is anything new. I’ve had this thing for birding for well over forty years, now. I know how it works and I have seen the craving to go birding hit other folks, too. I’ve seen them sell off many of their personal possessions to buy a new birding binocular or birdwatching spotting scope. I’ve seen them rush to the book store to buy every new bird guide as soon as it hits the shelf. I’ve been there, oh yeah, I’ve been there.

I have no regrets about spreading this infection. In fact, I’m rather proud that I have infected others with my birding fever. This birding and bird watching is a lifelong love affair and immersion in a world of intense beauty, color and drama; it’s a journey of learning that never ends and, most remarkably, it is all as accessible as your own backyard. That’s where I began my journey, oh so many years, ago. Welcome to my world!

I have owned and used both birding binoculars and astronomy binoculars for more years than I care to reveal. Let’s just say that I have used these and other types of binoculars more than most folks. In fact, most folks really don’t want or need a closet full of binoculars, so I am sometimes asked if there is one binocular that could be used for both birding and astronomy. If so, should they chose an astronomy binocular or a birding binocular?

The requirements for a good birding binocular are actually a bit more specific than the requirements for a good astronomy binocular, so my advice has always been to get a birding binocular. In other words, it easier to turn a birding binocular into an astronomy binocular than it is to turn an astronomy binocular into a birding binocular. Astronomy binoculars rarely have the close focus feature needed for serious birding and, even if they did, most of them focus too slowly to keep up with constantly moving birds. Then, too, most dedicated astronomy binoculars use an individual eyepiece focus system and this focus system is totally unsuited for the close in work you often get in a day of birding.

The idea in astronomy binoculars, of course, is to get a large objective for the performance you need to view those faint celestial objects. Therefore, when we think of astronomy binoculars, we usually think of a 50mm objective as a starting point and go up from there. However, I have done a lot of astronomy with 40mm objectives and not felt too deprived, as long as the optics were good. On the other hand, I do not like big heavy binoculars for my birding, so my recommendation for a good dual-purpose birding/astronomy binocular would be a 10x50. That is still small enough to carry all day for birding, but is also large enough for a lot of astronomy. In fact, a 10x50 is one of the most popular binocular sizes for many amateur astronomers who prefer to handhold their binoculars instead of mounting the binocular on an astronomy binocular tripod. Just be sure to check that focus on the 10x50 you choose if you also want to make it a good birding binocular.

May is such an interesting month in this part of the world. One week, the hardwood trees have yet to show their leaves and the natural world still appears to be in winter mode; the next week, the leaves have opened and the natural world is in a summer mode. For an outdoors person, this metamorphosis also means a big change in the way we operate when outdoors.

As a birder, spotting birds in trees is now a much, much more difficult task. After all, many of the birds we observe and no bigger than some leaves. Not that we really mind, though; May also brings us the greatest number of bird species we are likely to see in a day. Check the official, published bird counts nearly anywhere in the country and May is typically the big month for number of species seen. For many, then, the month of May is the month for birdwatching. Grab your birding binoculars and head out in the woods, NOW.

Tree foliage can work for and against astronomers. That new leaf cover can do a creditable job of blocking light pollution in your immediate area, such as an annoying street light or neighbor’s yard light. This is especially helpful for astronomers who use astronomical binoculars, since we are bit more mobile when using binoculars than when using telescopes. Binocular astronomers can walk around to any number of favorable locations in a single observing session without the hassle of a lot of equipment. On the other hand, no more peeking though leafless tree branches to spot a favorite star cluster, nebulae or galaxy. Our observing window definitely shrinks a bit, now.

For the photographer, the world becomes a much richer hunting ground when the leaves are on the trees and brush, since this also means wildflowers are blossoming and that, in turn, means the world has also become a much more colorful place. For sure, my digital cameras get more of a workout in May than in almost any month of the year. Seems like I can hardly get out of my backyard, some days when I have the camera in my hands. I just have to remember to pack along an extra battery.