Bird/animal-watching scope

[Viscera]

Greetings!

A co-worker of ours is retiring at the end of next month, and we want to get him a scope for his hobby, bird watching. I have no idea where to start, although some sporting goods stores might help. Anyone have any further ideas? We are looking to spend somewhere in the neighborhood of $100, although we could go a bit higher if need be.

Thanks in advance.

[Balduran]

These are also known as spotting scopes. Type that into a search engine and you'll see a gazillion places that sell them. I know around here camera stores and hobby stores often sell them also.

You can probably get something for $100, but prices for optics can vary greatly depending on quality. I bet a bird-watching society webpage would have reviews of current scopes on the market.

[screech-owl]

Contact me at my work e-mail I sent you. I have a whole collection of information for you (at work, of course).

[bare]

I hate to tell you that you can't even buy a decent pair of binoculars for a hundred dollars, much less a spotting scope.

If your co-worker is indeed a birder and that's all you can come up with, you might contribute a monetary sum towards his eventual purchase.

[Astroboy14]

I have to agree with bare here (great name, BTW!)... a decent spotting scope is gonna run you more than $100!

You can, maybe, track down a cheap one for $100... but if you want to go for quality of image, etc., you'll need more cash!

Maybe consider a different gift?

[VaHermit]

I assume that he's an older man since he's retiring. For birdwatching, I'd personally recommend a binocular rather than a monocular, much more comfortable and a lot more stable. Either way, bare in mind that the higher the power, the more stable the optics need to be held. You might be better off going with a cheaper set of optics and using the extra money to include a small tripod. The best lenses in the world aren't much good if your hands shake.

Try this site, http://www.scientificsonline.com/ , they have some nice optics. I've bought from them a few times and always found them to be dependable. Actually, you might want to browse through everything they have, lots of really cool Christmas ideas there.

Best of luck and happy holidays.

[Astroboy14]

Good point, VaHermit, but that is the beauty of a spotting scope over a pair of binocs... a spotting scope usually comes either with a tripod (if it doesn't, those are cheap!) or with an attachment to clamp the scope onto a windowsill, etc...

I still think that you need to be careful of the quality of the optics... and this is going to necessitate more than $100...