Thermal scope, anyone tried one?

[David.evans 5,323]

No mate 

but looking at the spec and the write ups , and how much they cost +if it goes tits up getting it fixed could be a problem, I’m sure Ian will be a long and give you the sp on the differences 

and do you really need a range finder at nite , ive zeroed the xq50 at 125 

And anything out to 250 is dead , don’t think you would be shooting further that that mate at nite 

the build quality of the pard is inferior to pulsar all day long 

if you want a nite out with me and have ago your more than welcome 

atb 

[Stavross 13,712]

On 06/05/2021 at 20:16, shovel leaner said:

Thermal can’t be blamed for stupid shooting and wrong identification . It’s been happening for years on the lamp . A guy I know of who ( I won’t call him a keeper) used to run a shoot , regularly shot at eyes and killed quite a few sheep , which were then thrown into the river . We used to call his rifle “ the mutton gun”. 

I know this is nothing to do with this thread but SL’s post reminded me of it

years ago before I had centrefires i used to jump at any opportunity to go out with the foxing lads, it was all still lamp and rifle, one of the lads was an eye shine shooter and everything seemed to be a fox to him, he’d shot cats, hares and deer in the past, one night he took me to one place, where I was the lamp man and he was the shooter, now I didn’t know this land and as I was lamping around I picked up two very bright eyes, I wasn’t sure what it was and the lad took a lot of time looking at it through the scope, I said to him “what is it” and he said “ I’m 90% it’s a fox “ from them words I thought, he’s going to take the shot ( 90% was good enough for him ) as soon as he pulled the trigger, with the red lamp on it I could see a big puff of feathers, walking over to it, he had not only shot an owl but the bloody thing had been sat on a gate post 4 foot of the ground with no back stop, certainly shows that 90% isn’t good enough and if you would shoot without knowing what’s behind what you are shooting at, you shouldn’t have an FAC

[shovel leaner 7,648]

13 minutes ago, Stavross said:

I know this is nothing to do with this thread but SL’s post reminded me of it

years ago before I had centrefires i used to jump at any opportunity to go out with the foxing lads, it was all still lamp and rifle, one of the lads was an eye shine shooter and everything seemed to be a fox to him, he’d shot cats, hares and deer in the past, one night he took me to one place, where I was the lamp man and he was the shooter, now I didn’t know this land and as I was lamping around I picked up two very bright eyes, I wasn’t sure what it was and the lad took a lot of time looking at it through the scope, I said to him “what is it” and he said “ I’m 90% it’s a fox “ from them words I thought, he’s going to take the shot ( 90% was good enough for him ) as soon as he pulled the trigger, with the red lamp on it I could see a big puff of feathers, walking over to it, he had not only shot an owl but the bloody thing had been sat on a gate post 4 foot of the ground with no back stop, certainly shows that 90% isn’t good enough and if you would shoot without knowing what’s behind what you are shooting at, you shouldn’t have an FAC

The guy I’m talking about was a bloody nightmare. The stories I’ve heard you wouldn’t believe. He not only shot a sheep but when he took the shot a courting couple immediately stood up . They had been lying in a fold in the ground between the unfortunate sheep and the idiot shooter . He also used to drive his Subaru pickup with his “mutton gun “ propped in the footwell of the passenger seat, loaded  , the mutton gun went off once ..... so what did he do ? Fitted an ariel in the roof through it . I could go on but I don’t want to bore you , you get the picture. Fox dropper knows him and could probably add to it . He wasn’t a horrible bloke, but he just shouldn’t have a firearm. 

[Born Hunter 17,622]

On 06/05/2021 at 11:37, ianm said:

Although i use thermal for spotting i am not too keen on them as a scope especially after the incident i had.

I was foxing one night with a mate, i had just met up with him and we where driving down a long concrete road to the farm. Either side of this four hundred yard long road are very low hedges. I scanned the right side as i was driving slowly. There was a fox mooching about two hundred yards along a hedge that runs at ninety degrees  to the one i was driving along. I stopped the Jimny and got my rifle set up on the top. I had a minutes delay as i couldn't find the magazine. Once everything was set i scanned again to make sure the fox was still there. It had moved closer and was sat in the hedge looking over towards us. I found it quickly in the Drone and then i could see what i was looking at wasn't a fox but the farmers sheepdog. Had i been using a thermal scope i would of shot it and the farmer would of been a dog light. The actual fox i had first seen was in the next field and i shot it a few minutes later.

Hence why i am wary of thermal scopes. Better to be 100% sure than risk shooting someones dog.  

There was also a case where two blokes where shooting a golf course using all thermal. One of them spotted a fox in the rough margins adjacent to some houses. The other bloke shot it and it turned out to be a whippet having a pee from one of the houses. They both lost their FACs and rightly so.   

I've had similar experience with other quarry and livestock and heard tales of the same. Either shots wouldn't have been taken because of thermal or worse, shots would have. Thermal NV combo certainly has benefits.

[Alsone 789]

On 06/05/2021 at 20:16, shovel leaner said:

Thermal can’t be blamed for stupid shooting and wrong identification . It’s been happening for years on the lamp . A guy I know of who ( I won’t call him a keeper) used to run a shoot , regularly shot at eyes and killed quite a few sheep , which were then thrown into the river . We used to call his rifle “ the mutton gun”. 

I kind of disagree although plod will take any excuse to remove you.

Some things are inexcusable. However, trying to discern between a fox and a dog on private land where it should be at night through thermal is going to be difficult to impossible especially if distance is involved as Ian pointed out with his experience. That's the problem with thermal, you're hunting shapes and sizes not easily identifiable targets and wherever there's ambiguity in identification, mistakes can happen.

I feel sorry for the guys who lost their ticket. A fox sized dog is going to be almost impossible to distinguish through thermal and if on private land where it shouldn't be, how were you supposed to know? Plod would say you should have positvely identified the target before shooting but at night, if thermal is your identification tool, what else could you do? If it looks like a fox through thermal, what other option have you got to run up to it, identify it by sight from 1ft, then ask it to freeze and run back to the rifle.

I kind of have to agree with Ian. The safest way to use thermal is for spotting with NV for positive identification / shot.