Spotting Scopes, Straight Eye Piece vs. 45deg Eye Piece
With so many options out there for gear these days, there’s no wonder that there is so much debate between hunters as to what products are the latest and greatest, old news, or tried and true.
As a hunter, I take a lot of pride in the gear I carry around with me in the field. And it’s true that some of my gear isn’t the top of the line or the best product on the market, but it works for me, and more importantly, it’s what I can afford. Now one of my favorite things to do with my hunting buddies, just like most of you is argue about what you have in your bag compared to what they have in theirs. If I have one of my Savage rifles and they have a Browning, Savage is the best thing out there. If I’m wearing Meindl’s, why are they wearing Kenetreks? You get the picture. It’s a game my buddies and I have been playing our whole lives and as we get older and our toys get pricier, there really doesn’t seem to be an end to it.
Optics is a great case in point. About eight years ago I really went out on a limb and bought myself a BSA spotting scope. Now I had never actually used a spotter with a forty five degree eye piece, but I was convinced that it was the next greatest thing to happen to optics, and none of my buddies had one. Turns out, that in my opinion, I was right. Now if a hunter is spending most of his time spotting from a vehicle, I can’t argue that the forty five on a window mount is better than a straight eye piece, because it’s not. But after years of laying under my tripod on my back or craning my neck , trying to look at sheep, mountain goats, and mule deer that were straight up or down a mountain from me, I knew there had to be something better.
Now it’s eight years later and I’ve since upgraded to a Leica spotter with the forty five while my buddies are using everything from Nikons, Vortex, and Swarovski HD’s, all with straight eye pieces. While most of these guys won’t argue about the quality of the glass in the Leica, they will still shy away from the eye piece debate.
During a mountain goat hunt last week I ran into some guys I know, guys that I consider to be probably some of the most serious mountain goat hunters anywhere. We sat on the side of the mountain and glassed some goats, and then the “long eyes” started coming out. By the time these guys grabbed their spotters, laid down in the snow so they could see through them and located the goats, I had already been watching them while sitting upright, comfortably looking down through my eye piece.
While they were all eager to look through my spotter, which of course I believed to be the best, because it came out of my bag, I asked them WHY were they still using the straight eye piece?
They all said the same thing… “I can’t find anything in that stupid forty five.”
So it was a quick lesson in forty five fundamentals. I’m no expert with optics, but here’s the quickest way I have found to finding an animal in your spotter with the forty five. While you’re glassing with your binoculars, find a landmark, not necessarily near the animal, but vertical to the animal, either up or down, it doesn’t matter. A lot of the time I prefer a mark on the skyline above the animal or a landmark on a closer ridge or in a creek bottom below. Once you have your landmark it’s simply moving the spotter up or down to the animal. Once you get the hang of it, it’s really easy.
Some of the other things I really like about the forty five is that if you’re glassing down hill, you can have your tripod between your legs, shielding the scope from the wind while looking straight down into the eye piece, where if you were using a straight eye piece you would have to be lying on your stomach, using one of the compact tripods most of us use in the mountains.
Uphill is where I like the forty five the most. Many times, I won’t even pull out my tripod, I just throw my pack down and lay my spotter on top of it. Trying this with a straight eye piece would mean laying on your stomach and craning your neck back to look through the scope.
The next time you’re shopping for a spotter, or even if you’re in a sporting goods store, grab one of each and try them out. With a little practice you’ll be able to find and animal in the forty five just as fast as the straight eye piece, you’ll be way more comfortable, and most importantly….. you’ll agree that what I have in my bag is better! lol
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I'm Cory Jmaeff (Jammer), I began hunting as soon as I could walk. Spending countless hours in the footsteps of accomplished hunters in my family. I would love to thank my beautiful wife and 2 kids for allowing me to spend as much time outdoors as I do!
Shawn Wudrich brings a lifetime of hunting and ten years of guiding and outfitting experience to Antler Outdoors. With a passion for hunting the mountains and having had the experience of hunting all over North America, Shawn's personality and knowledge of hunting shines through on camera.
