wildcat junkie

The Leupold 1.5-4 X 20 has a minimum 3 3/4" eye relief on 4X and over 4" on 1.5X. https://www.leupold.com/scopes/rifle-scopes/vx-freedom-1-5-4x20

I don't want to depend on batteries while hunting in anything other than a flashlight. No red dots, no GPS. With either you are SOL if the batteries go dead. When I hunted big woods I carried spare batteries and bulb for my flashlight. I don't use a flashlight for difficult blood trailing after dark near home either. While you can swap batteries in a flashlight of they go dead, that's not an option with a red dot when a buck appears and you find your battery is dead.

I got some better pictures of the fisher at my other camera location. This is about 300 yds from the other camera.

Look closely. There are 2 more on the edge of the light.

What about camo bed spreads and comforters?

You are sacrificing the time when deer activity usually peaks. The only time I am concerned with being able to follow a blood trail is when rain is a factor. Thermal vision only works if you have some idea of where the animal went. Unless the animal only went a short distance, how can you use it without some sort if trail to follow in heavy cover?

How do you keep from getting overheated on the walk in?

When hunting on the ground in open hardwoods in the midwest, I used to wear 2 contrasting camo patterns. Desert camo pants slipped over inner layers, and some sort of tree bark/branch camo jacket. I watched my brother in law walk away from me. Once he was 75 yds or more away, it was amazing how he disappeared. No matter what the background, there was no obvious human form apparent. It also seemed to work well in exposed tree stands. I once reloaded my muzzleloader while a deer stared at me after I ran about 80 yds away and stopped. I was able to drop it in addition to the one I killed with the 1st shot as it trotted under me at less than 15 yds.

I got 2 of them last Christmas for my son when Dick's had a $30 rebate on top of a good price. I think they were $59.99 before the rebate. We were shopping for things to "fill out" the amount we had budgeted for each person in the Christmas list. So far I'm really happy with them. I would like to have about 4 more.

He was busted for poaching a deer on film in a state park. There was some sort of terrain/landmark that gave him away.

I hope he had on a pair of thick leather gloves.

In my youth we used to hunt cottontail at night with recurve bows in the sparsely populated suburbs south of Chicago. If you shoot truly instinctive, as long as you can pick a spot, you can hit it.

There are still many that oppose any sort of BO requirements. I posted a thread a few years back and got a lot of criticism.

Well, nothing says you couldn't still hunt small game with an I/C choke and sights on the rib.

A pump shotgun with a vent rib and screw in chokes can serve well as a slug gun. The I/C choke tube and some sights that clamp onto the rib will do a good job with foster or other weight forward type slugs.

If you don't have time to make the 1st shot count, how will you have time for a "follow up shot"? Of the 50 or more deer I have killed over the last 35 years or so, I have had to shoot 2 a 2nd time. One was after I walked up on him as he was crawling away with a broken back. The other after I clipped the tops of the shoulder blades on a close jump shot. That 2nd deer was shot with a traditional muzzleloader using a patched round ball and real black powder. I was able to reload and put another ball through the back of his head from the same spot where was standing when I made the 1st shot. When I started hunting deer in Southern Indiana in the late 1970s, I opted for the greater accuracy of muzzleloaders over the shotguns available at that time. Make the 1st shot count and you won't need another.

I had a Remington M58 semi auto with a skeet barrel in my possession for a while. I had borrowed it for jump shooting cottontails. The choke restriction was actually about 8" or so back from the muzzle. It shot wide even patterns with 7 1/2 shot and by lining up the double beads in a figure 8 sight picture it was deadly accurate with foster slugs to 75 yards or more.. At 50 yards it would shoot cloverleaf groups. Never used it for deer hunting though as I had a hand built .54 percussion rifle that would shoot 2" groups at 100 yards wit a patched .535 round ball over 100 grs fffG.

Never said it was. In fact I posted a thread here a few years back about accepting a mandatory BO requirement in exchange for extended hunting hours. There was quite a backlash over that.

I would be willing to bet that most of those states have some sort of mandatory Blaze Orange requirements.

A Coleman lantern with a good reflector makes blood trailing after dark much easier. If I have a blood trail to follow as it gets dark, I go to the house to get wifey and the Coleman lantern. Something about the lantern light makes the red color of blood pop out. Wifey can spot blood a lot better than I can, day or night.

I always told them that I would "let them know". Sometimes they got upset with the way I "let them know". Seems you just can't please them no matter what you do.

I can't think of a single state that doesn't allow 1/2 hour before/after sunrise/sunset. I'm not saying there aren't others like NY but none comes to mind.

I know what this is though.

I'm not real familiar with either, but it looks too big to be a Maten.