night vision

G

gahunter2

New member
I'm new to the forum and new to night vision and need some "expert" advice. I recently purchased a Pulsar Digisight N550 and a Flir thermal viewer to hunt beavers with and have some questions.

I can detect the animal with the Flir (as long as he's not under water :)) but I have trouble seeing the animal with the night vision scope. The scope works great on the edge of an open field. However if I'm in a stand behind a few limbs, the limbs appear too bright and I can't see behind them. For example, if I'm trying to shoot something 50 yards away and a few branches are in front of me, all I can see are the branches and not the animal beyond them. I can easily see the animal with a spotlight which of course defeats the purpose of night vision. Is this unique to "digital" night vision or is this true of something like gen 3 night vision?

Next question, I'm trying to shoot beavers at about 100 yards and I can't quite see them clear enough to shoot while they are swimming (too small). I got an extra infrared illuminator and that helped a lot but I still need a "clearer" picture. I've seen Gen 3 night vision that mounts in front of a regular scope. Does this give you a clearer view or is it still "fuzzy"?

Thanks in advance!
 
what your are experiencing is washout or blooming from you're IR hitting the branches before the target, commom with any NV gear turn your IR off or focus the beam tighter, thermal will not do this but again you won't see the obstructions in the bullets path
 
Originally Posted By: the impactzonewhat your are experiencing is washout or blooming from you're IR hitting the branches before the target, commom with any NV gear turn your IR off or focus the beam tighter, thermal will not do this but again you won't see the obstructions in the bullets path

+1

I think you need better NV and less IR in that scenario. this isn't a problem if you have a clear line of sight to your target.
 
I have two lights from bigpig.com
red and green
both work excellent
due to the range I can get a shot,the red works better for me
I would swap the green light.extra battery,and charger
for a decent 22mag or 17hmr
the green ,you can see 150-200yrds easy
the red is for 100 yrds or less
when you look through the scope its like daytime in green
the pigs and yotes don't seem to be scared of it
 
Thanks for the comments, although not what I wanted to hear. You're right about the "blooming", but there isn't anything I can do about it. The IR can't be focused. I could swing Gen 3 but that's the limit of my budget. If it's not going to do much better, then I'll have to go back to using a spotlight. The Flir is great for finding animals, but a lot of time I'll "see" the animal with the Flir but can't "see" it with a spotlight because of brush, etc.
 
I took care of some beavers for a guy once, had a hard time at first getting a clean shot on the head, then set up a tripod next to the pond 15' tall had a good angle and clear shot from then on would some times use a shotgun with #2 that worked well too. would sit with no lights on a watch to movement on the water.

not to rag on your gear but I hunted with a n550 once! would not take it over my gen2shp and its not even close to my gen3
 
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You did not mention which IR emitter you are using. Get one that will focus the beam down to match the FOV in the scope and that will help with IR feedback into the scope.

Once you do that try to adjust the scope settings. There are numerous settings on that scope to work with....Sumlight, Contrast, Brightness, and the Forward Focus and Rear Focus. Make sure you do not turn on the built in emitter when using an external unit.

With an emitter on turn OFF the Sumlight mode and use the manual brightness and contrast. If you hunt in bright moonlight just leave the Sumlight mode ON and use the manual brightness and contrast and NO emitter. Keep in mind that the the Sumlight mode has a default setting and it turns back on every time you cycle the scope off and then back on again.

If you are working a small area you can get an EagleTac emitter and just rig a tripod mount for it. Set it up in front of the foliage shining on the pond where you expect the beavers to show and leave it on. It has a high and low setting and if low does the job it should last a while.

The Torch Pro from TNVC will focus to a tight beam. It does not have X/Y axis adjustments but that should not be a problem depending on how you mount it. Just keep in mind that this is an 805nm emitter and will produce a nice red glow for the beavers to see. The EagleTac runs at 850nm which should help with that issue especially on the low setting. However, the EagleTac beam will spread and cause a lot of IR feedback around thick foliage if you try to use it gun mounted.

http://tnvc.com/shop/tnvc-torch-pro-infrared-illuminator/

http://illuminationgear.com/14322/26971.html
( Get the T100 C2 3.4W)

If you hunt right after a good rain.....tear out a small portion of the dam and they will hear the water running and come to repair it.

Maybe you can set up like Impact suggested......if there is a good tree close just use a climbing stand to get above the foliage. Also you can prepare your setup ahead of time during the day by cutting back the limbs, bushes, etc. that might cause the most IR feedback.







 
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The gen 3 will be clearer and need less light than the pulsar units, but if you like what you see with the thermal then a thermal gun sight is what you want. The IR light will cause the blinding with both digital or NV if it reflects off anything close by. Getting setup with a clear view or waiting for a night with 1/2 moon or better should solve the problem and not cost you $$$. Portable tree stand= clear view= no more beavers
laugh.gif
 
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I thought about getting a thermal gun sight, but I don't think it would work good for me. I see lots of animals in "thermal" but they are behind brush, grass, etc. and unless I use a 3" magnum with buckshot, I think the grass would deflect the bullets.
 
Problem with the "tripod" is that I have about a mile of creek to cover. The beavers travel up and down it so I usually have to use a canoe.

I do have one place where I have an enclosed deer stand (4x8) over looking a food plot and behind the stand is a little creek that the beavers dammed up. I cleared a shooting lane to the dam so I don't have any problem with "blooming" but it is 90 yards to the dam and those little heads are hard to hit swimming so I don't try. A few have gotten up on the bank and they were easy shots.

Gman757I think you're right about the illuminator. The one I have is a Streamlight Super TAC Long Range and doesn't have a focus. I'm pretty sure it has scared off some raccoons. You gave me some good links.

All of the adjustments you mention I don't think are on my scope. I think all I have is a "focus" and "brightness" but I'll check.

Oh and this is kind of recreational, I've been trapping them for 20 years and can clean them out in a few weeks with traps.
 
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Funny beaver story, when I was a kid (grew up in a rural area), the guys at school talked about how hard a beaver head was. 1 guy swore a 270 would bounce off one, he SAW it! Anything less than a cannon wouldn't kill them. So I decided to try an experiment and got a beaver skull that had been trapped, covered it with some "shag" carpet (now you know how old I am) and started shooting it to see how "hard" the head was. Needless to say anything from a 22 long rifle up will penetrate at close range. These guys were obviously missing (not hard to do) or hitting the water.

I've shot a boatload with a 22 but have found it to be pretty light for them. Once they are hit, most of the time they will roll over a few times and swim off or sink even with head shots. I prefer a more humane kill (can a kill be humane?) anyhow a 22 magnum seems to be about right unless it's a long shot then I'll use a 223.

An AR is practically useless where I hunt. In the canoe, you may get a shot at 50 yards and then the next one will be at 10 feet. With the scope up so high on an AR and zeroed at 100 yards, you'll be off more than a "beaver head" at 10 feet. A 10/22 Magnum or Mini 14 with a low scope mount seems to be off only an inch or so.

A shotgun is really best for close shots, but for some reason I'd rather use a rifle. And yes #2 works good and actually #6 will work up close.

I have also witnessed 2 beaver "attacks", 1 "bumped" my canoe a couple of times and another chased my dad up on a stump in a beaver pond. He was wearing waders and kept poking at it with his shotgun (we were duck hunting and he didn't want to shoot it). I was on the bank dying laughing. You could hear little baby beavers making noise inside of the lodge. Strange world we live in. Sorry, but i digress
smile.gif
 
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Originally Posted By: gahunter2

Gman757

All of the adjustments you mention I don't think are on my scope. I think all I have is a "focus" and "brightness" but I'll check.


You are just looking at the knobs...... The little square buttons are functional also.

There is software that lets you make your own reticle and upload it into the scope. If you wanted to take the time to work it out you could make your own ballistic reticle that would match whatever you shoot and be able to hit more precisely for head shots. There is enough offset with the scope to create a pretty good POI change from 10 yards to 100 yards on the reticle.

If you are just playing around I doubt you want to spend $3k plus on Gen 3 or a lot more that that on thermal when the scope you have will get the job done if you take time to set it up correctly.

Of course, a good friend of mine spent almost a million $ just to get rid of one beaver......but that's a long story.


 
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Thanks Gman757, I guess I'll have to break one of my "cardinal" rules and read the manual. One of the standard reticles works great. Zero at 100 yards and then down 2 "wide" bars and then the next "narrow" bar and I'm dead on at 10 yards.

$1 million is a lot for one beaver, but these cost about $50,000 in timber before I took over the farm. Before my dad passed away he used to trap them with conibears. He'd get a few but there were always some he couldn't catch, so he finally gave up.

I got a trapping video by a guy named Charles Dobbins and learned how to really trap. Conibears usually only work on the young and dumb. Once I started using footholds, snares and drowning wires the game changed. They haven't really done too much damage since, but I have to stay after them. They just come down (or up?) the creek from my neighbor's land. You can look at Google maps and it's almost one long string of beaver dams till you get to my property.
 
The Pulsar you have is about a 100 to 150 yard sight (using the IR) based on my limited experience with it. If you have the IR light turned on when you are experiencing the problems with the branch washout, that (having the IR light on) is definately your problem. Hitting a swimming beaver head with a rifle at any range much beyond 50 yards (day or night) would take more luck than skill for me. Maybe you should consider a short range setup like a PVS-14 or MX-160 hands free goggle mount in combination with a laser or Eotech sight on a shotgun. Just float out there in your boat and wait for them to surface. Kevin
 
Originally Posted By: HTRN57 Maybe you should consider a short range setup like a PVS-14 or MX-160 hands free goggle mount in combination with a laser or Eotech sight on a shotgun. Just float out there in your boat and wait for them to surface. Kevin

+1 not a bad idea
 
I popped one last night. I left the night vision at home and just used the Flir and a Ruger 10/22 Magnum w/ a Streamlight weapon light mounted on a rail. I just floated down the creek using the Flir. About 10:00 I saw a small red "blob" (I wouldn't have seen him if I wasn't using "instalert") zig zag in front of me coming upstream. I dropped the Flir, threw up the rifle and had a split second to make the shot. Distance was about 20 yards. Hit him in the head and he dove, came up rolling and then dove and then came up rolling again. As he surfaced, he was about 10 yards and I emptied a magazine. He went under again and came up close enough I could have grabbed him. I just held the gun over the edge of the canoe and emptied another magazine. He stopped rolling upside down and then sank. I was pretty disappointed in the performance of the 22 magnum. I've had better luck before. Think I'll go back to shooting a 223, I just hate the noise.

As to the red dot, I think I would do better sticking with a scope. I've tried 1.5x but seem to be able to hit them better with about 3 to 4x with a close focusing scope. When you are at water level a beaver swimming is a pretty small target.

You're definitely right about the shotgun, I just prefer to use a rifle. For some reason I feel like it's cheating to shoot something with a shotgun that's not flying (burglars are an exception).
 
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well a mag full of 22mags it equal to a 3" 12ga 00bk, I take it your just removing problem beavers and if that's the case the fur on the bank is the goal.
 
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Maybe you're not using the right ammo. I love the ballistic tip ammo. Remington and Hornady make it. I shoot the s --t out of armadillos and many times they would run off after being hit with a hollow point. I knew they were going to die, but then the little buggers started stinking, bad. Switched to the ballistic tips and they never took another step. Sometimes hard to get a good shot at night when you turn on the light.
 
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