Thermal/night vision scopes

[buffalobo]

100-200yds at night can be really far and depends on what you are trying to do. On a static range, an IR laser and 1x PVS14 can ring 200yd steel all night (high visibility). However, if your hunting coyotes and they are stopped and not looking your way (No eye reflection), 200yds would be a very challenging shot even with a PVS-27. That's assuming no fog or other issues that impact visibility.

Thermal is great for finding things but is limited by resolution for proper ID at night. My NOX35 allows for shooting 2" wide steel I targets at 200yds, but I am not actually resolving the target, I'm just holding center of a hot pixel. Very long shots are possible, but are you shooting a coyote or your neighbors dog? Are you shooting center of the heat or actually aiming for the vitals?

I've tried quite a few night vision and thermal devices. Min budget as BP mentioned is probably $2.5k for Thermal and $3k for a Gen 3 passive scope. The Gen 1/2 stuff I have tried felt pretty worthless. I've never dabbled in the digital scopes which are likely better budget options these days when paired with a powerful illuminator.

The Hogster 35 (384res, 2.0x Optical, $2600), I owned was probably a good example of the $2.5K thermal price point. Something like a skunk would be <80yd, coyote <140yd. Really comes down to user expectations and what they consider acceptable.

Been hoping you would chime in.

Thermal would be for spotting/detection only and NV for identification and sighting. Probably Mrs bo or one of the minions using hand held or tripod mounted.

ID ability is top of list. We have a neighbor who has a pair of Great Pyrennes dogs that escape now and again. They are good coyote hunters and have been great help keeping numbers down.

Would like to be able to stage from the deck but will probably have to stage from large dirt pile on the minions mx track out back. Deck would require ability to ID and sight 125-200 yard. Dirt pile is 50 yds closer to coyote path and raised 8-10 ft in elevation.