New scope incoming

So last night, I decided to take the plunge. Surfing different sites, and weighing a sales specialist’s thoughts on “reasonably priced” spotting scopes, I ordered a Vortex Viper HD 20-60×85 spotting scope. I was planning on purchasing it through Optics4Birding, which I highly recommend, but they currently have a 6-8 week backorder wait. I don’t like to wait. Now, the scope retails for $899 at almost all dealers. But, when I went to B&H Photo, they had an email connection for best price, which I hit up. The B&H price? $749, so even with sales tax, I was out at under $800, a $100 savings! And B&H offers free two-day FedEx shipping on its products, so as this seemed like a win-win for me, I ordered it.

The Vortex HD 20-60×85 angled spotting scope has a 20-60x magnification with an 85mm objective lens diameter, is 17.5″ long and weighs 4.8 lbs. It is made of ArmorTek, has a built-in sun shade, and its glass is XR fully multicoated. This scope is in fact a step down from what I had previously owned – Zeiss Victory Harpia 95 – but from all the reviews I have read and input from sales specialists, it’s supposed to be a great scope and a much more manageable price. The Harpia scope that I had currently retails for almost $5000 new, and weighs over 5 lbs. When I get my new scope and have time to take it into the field, I will post comments here about it.

So I got the scope. I checked out my current tripod, and it weighs a TON. That was the next thing that I worked on. There are so many different tripods and combinations that it’s dizzying. I looked at the Vortex carbon fiber, but got scared away from user reviews stating that it has issues with leg breaks and becoming unslotted, among other things. I looked at a couple of other brands, including Field Optics Research, Celestron, Slik, and Gitzo. It turned out that with the prices of these other companies, I could afford to purchase a Manfrotto tripod, which I love. They’re less expensive the Gitzo most of the time, and I feel just as good, if not better. What I went with is the Manfrotto MT055CXPRO3 tripod, and the Manfrotto 502AH pro video head, also ordered from B&H. Overall weight for both the tripod and head is less than 8 lbs. The tripod itself is carbon fiber, and extends to 66.9″. I’m not so sure how the spotting scope-tripod combo will work carrying into the field, but the system will be great along shorelines within a short walk from the car. Everything is expected to arrive on Thursday, which means I’ll be out on Friday testing the combo in the field, probably at Fairport Harbor State Park first.

In other news, I’m planning on attending the Shreve Migration Sensation on March 9th in Shreve and hosted by the Wilderness Center at Shreve. I’m particularly excited by the fact that Greg Miller of “BigcYear” fame will be there, and hopefully I can meet him and get a selfie! And of course there will be plenty of birding at various sites, including Killbuck Marsh and Funk Bottoms.

Cute little Owls

This morning, I went to the Cleveland Lakefront Nature Preserve, an 88-acre park located on Lake Erie to the west of Cleveland proper. The highlight was two Northern Saw-whet Owls, gray morph, perched high above on their respective pine trees. They are so small and so cute, and it was great to view them this morning, along with other species including immature Red-shouldered Hawk, White-throated Sparrow, Carolina Wrens and Dark-eyed Juncos bathing and playing in the streams. I then went to Fairport Harbor and got FOY Bufflehead, so it was a very good day for me. I’m now at 40 FOY species, but who’s counting. Not the best shot below, but you can see him/her….

Today I also started taking a look at getting a new, real spotting scope. I was out today with my camera, and at the high end of zoom, it did not work as well as I thought it would. I had also bought a very cheap 25-75×60 spotting scope from Temu, paid only $53 for it and figured what the hell, give it a try. It’s very dark and not unusually sharp at, well, any distance. But now, I am looking at 20-60×85 Vortex Diamondback as it’s in my price range. I was also looking at the Nikon ProStaff in the same range, and the sales associate at Optics4Birding commented that it was basically a crap scope for $599. There’s so many different models and hard to tell the differences between them.

If figuring out what spotting scope weren’t hard enough, the next pick is a tripod. Things like height and weight really matter, as well as what tripod head it comes with. Carbon fiber is the lightest, and also the most expensive, and it would be easy to buy a scope that is more expensive than the scope itself. Gitzo and Manfrotto are the most expensive tripod systems to buy, are also the lightest. Aluminum tripods are the most reasonably priced, but also heavier and sometimes not as sturdy.

So I will be evaluating all of these things while considering the purchase of a new spotting scope system.

New new year and days…

Well… its been a long time since I have written anything here. I had my absolute best year in 2020, but became disillusioned with a few things and actually quit birding since that time. I would occasionally look out for birds on my trips around the state, but no serious birding for me at all. I even sold my Zeiss spotting scope, and my beloved Zeiss Victory SF bins, which I could kick myself about. But with the opening of 2024, I’m back to birding, and I don’t really care about max numbers of species seen or any competitive stuff, I just want to see the birds.

I recently got a new pair of bins, the Zeiss Conquest 10×42’s, and also a new birding camera, back with the ole reliable Nikon Coolpix 950; it’s really a beast in the field and I’ve taken so many great images with it, like the lemon below:

So, now I’m kind of back with a vengeance, and looking forward to mid-May, when all of the beauties return to our landscape to show off their colors. I’ve already scheduled an overnight to Grayling, Michigan to observe the rare Kirtland’s Warbler in its breeding habitat. Hoping that maybe I might get lucky and catch a Cerulean as well… who knows?

I’ve already begun birding at all of my old haunts, notably Portage Lakes, Summit Lake, and Fairport Harbor thus far. I’ve seen tons of Coots everywhere, and Red-breasted Mergansers appeared in notable numbers in mid-January, but have seemed to disappear. I’m not seeing anywhere near the numbers of ducks as in past years, and have yet to even see a Bufflehead, though yesterday I did catch Canvasback and Redhead individuals.

So, here we go again… lets see if we can have some fun and see lots of birds this year. I feel that everything is coming earlier than usual, and that ranges may be changing, as there had been a fair number of rares seen over the past couple of months… the Ancient Murrelet in NE Ohio-Lake Erie, and there’s still a Red-flanked Bluetail being observed in New Jersey!

Please feel free to say ‘hi’ and I’m always looking to bird with others, if you live in NE Ohio. Also please note: this website is “KeriBirder.life,” not to be confused with KeriBirder.com.