New Hunt
 

Ok so I am going this year on my first western mule deer hunt in NV. I have hunted for whitetails for years back east and my cheaper pair of binos worked just fine. But being that I will be doing a lot more glassing I am trying to pick what optics to purchase. Last year I bought a cheap spotting scope its ok but not that good. So with my budget I can get either say the Vortex viper hd 15x50 binoculars and keep the cheap spotting scope til next year if I even use it or get say the vortex diamondbacks and the nomad for the spotting scope. So I guess I am saying out west here would you rather have premium binos or ok of each.

When hunting and glassing out west, a good pair of binos comes in handy for sure. Myself, anything over 10X gets hard to manage. Though 15x is nice, I would much preferr a good lighter weight 10X.

But are the binos or scope more important. I am trying which one to spend money on this year. I have ok of both but would like to upgrade which one I will be using more of. Thanks.

I'd upgrade my binos.

Good Luck!

[QUOTE=dmick33;3943000]But are the binos or scope more important. I am trying which one to spend money on this year. I have ok of both but would like to upgrade which one I will be using more of. Thanks.[/QUOTE

In my opinion a good pair of binos will get alot more use than a spotter, especially if you are doing alot of hiking, which I find is usually the case. Plus a good spotter is generally more expensive than a pair good binos.

Thanks guys I think I am going to get the vortex viper hd's

May be too late .. but here goes anyway. I have hunted eastern Montana several times now. And that is about as open a country as one can imagine. A good quality 8x40 or 10x40 is the way to go.

A 15x50 ? Not for me. If you do a bunch of stalking a bino that large and heavy will start feeling like a mill stone around your neck. And the 15X .... going to be tough to keep steady enough to stay on "spot" at long distances. And that is a big deal when you are deciding to go or not to go. If you decide to go with the 15x50's and they will attach to one, I strongly suggest a tripod.

I tried toting a spotting scope ... only once. May as well have brought a baseball bat for all the good that spotting scope did me. The binos did just fine for the 2000 +/-yards I was spotting across.

Also I started out in MOntana with relatively inexpensive Nikon 10x40's. About $200 range price wise. Fine for down here in SE Alabama, but not nearly crisp enough to make out details at 1000-1500 yards.

Vortex may make good stuff ... I don't know. Pentax's binos that are in the $500-$600 range are a pretty darned good value. I use a Swarovski 8x40. Took me a while to save up enough to buy them but worth every dollar when it comes to long hours spent spotting across 1-3 miles of bad lands. Especially when daylight is at its weakest.

And as for which is more important? If I am forced to choose, I'm top dollar into the bino. That is what you'll use to find the game. A good quality scope can usually get the job done when it comes time for the kill shot.

I am going to get the binos but you think the 15 are too much. I just want to be able to see quit a ways or will it be to hard to pick out mullies in there bed?

15X is way too much unless you use them on a tripod, or have some other method of bracing them. Any shake at all and they are not usable. A good pair of 10X binoculars usually works well for finding game.

I am not a big Vortex fan, but to each his own.

Has anyone used the 12 power leupold mojave?

My opinion is that 10X - 40 is plenty. Like I posted earlier, I have hunted open country a good deal. I found high quality 10X-40mm binos to be about optimum. For me performace was more about the crispness of the imagery and the performance in low light, rather than having high "X" for super long distance viewing. Spot and stalk style hunting, which is about useless here in the deep south due to the heavy cover, is great fun. I would say that I spent 10-15 times as many hours spotting as I did stalking ! And for sure I found out the hard way that excellent binoculars really helped me see the details out there in the 2000-3000 yard range. The $250 Nikon binos I took the first time did fine ... until I needed to see clearly at these longer distances. I had plenty of "X" but the clarity and contrast was just nor there. No doubt high end 15X would top high end 10X in the "details at a distance" category, but I think that it would be very difficult to hold them steady without a tripod mount (something else to carry), and if you are going to be doing a ton of walking like I had to, every once counts! Something like a typical 15X-50 would feel like a bag of Sackrete at the end of the day !

I took my spotting scope the first time. I never really needed it. If I had been spotting miles out there, for hours on end from one set-up, a spotting scope would have make sense.

Binos
 

If possible , upgrade although it may not be a complete need that you have it . But if you can upgrade I'd say do that . You want the best you can get in the field anyway .

A "decent scope" is all you need. But for ALOT of continued, hours each day of use, you'll get "your $$$$ worth" by getting the better stuff. My everyday/usual/ in the woods binocs here at home are 9x40 Bighorns (Steiner). But in 2004 I went on a mulie/lope hunt in Buffalo, WY. I had been wanting a high powered pair of nocs already for long range deerhunting & summer scouting, the hunt just gave me more excuse. I went with the 15x45 Conquest (Zeiss) and after a week of hours on end of use in WY, was I ever glad I had bought a good pair. The cheap stuff all works well at the sales counter, but hours & days on end of use out in the field will "tell the tale". No eye strain or headaches with the Zeiss! & 15 is not really that hard to hold still.