The peep sight issue in low light is two fold.

#1) The small diameter of the hole in the peep sight reduces the amount of light that is reaching your eye. It works just like the iris in a camera lens. If you want to reduce the exposure on the film, you reduce the size of the iris which reduces the amount of light, hence a darker picture.

#2) When it starts to get dark, most peep sights being black no longer allow the archer to see the outline of the peep sight and thus are unable to properly center the sight housing or pin in their peep.

A number of peep manufacturers in recent years have gone to some form of lighted ring or fiber optic pins to enhance your night shooting ability, however they are only helping #2 above. The lighted area around the peep allows you to center the sight eaiser, but at what expense? The cost for this lighting behind the peep is reduced performance of #1. The light from the fibers or other source on the archer side of the peep causes more light to enter the eye, and the pupil to slightly close down to account for this extra light. The problem is that the extra light is not coming off of your target (deer) and therefore only causes the contrast to go down. You may get some extra shooting time with these peeps, however the reason your last peep didn't work and this one did was #2, not #1.

Think about it in these terms. When it is dark out and someone shines a light in your face you loose sight of everything else in your field of view. The eye adjusts to the intensity of the point source (flashlight) and consequently reduces the light being gathered from all other non illuminated objects. This is why when you put your hand up to shield your eyes from the flashlight, you can start to see beyond just the light. Same concept when looking into the daylight sky with the sun in your field of view.

In the optical world a small iris like a peep sight is known as a spatial filter, and it is used to reduce light interference from sources that are not the one you are looking at, thus improving the quality of your measurement.

If you want to improve the performance of #1 above, the only option is a larger aperature (peep). A larger aperature = more light = longer shooting hours.


To be quite honest, the best thing for low light shooting is truly a NoPeep. I have had one on my hunting rig for a number of years, and it does extend your shooting light well beyond what any peep sight will.