Trying to save walking time when checking traps before work. My area is a lot of clean farming meaning the ground is worked tight to everything and very few farm lanes. I was wondering if anyone has tried night vision binoculars to save time in the mornings when still dark. Any brand recommendations?

Yeah, I understand it won’t show snapped traps or sets that need attention but I can take care of that after work.

The cost is gonna cut down profits!

Why would you need night vision binocs? If you are checking in the dark just shine a beam at your set. If a critter is there, it will look at the light. No glowing eyes, no critter.

Yeah cost could very be too much but was hoping somebody had tried the cheaper brands.
Hobbie- that’s a good point but I have no experience with night vision. I was hoping when set are slightly hid that thermal would still pick up,the heat imprint. No idea if that is true.

[quote=Thumbian] I was hoping when set are slightly hid that thermal would still pick up,the heat imprint. No idea if that is true.[/quo

That is correct. Essentially the quality of the image will depend on the unit and thats a touch price point dependant. I'm not sure if there is such a thing as thermal binocs. You want a thermal scanner--hand held monocular. Its what we run to hunt at night.

Upside is unit picks up heat unlike the MANY times that you dont get a reflection of eyes in light beam particularly for very cautious/calm critters that keep their head down. Secondly, theres no beam bouncing around causing everyone and their brother for a mile away to wonder what you are doing especially in the early mornings around deer season when you dont need the extra attention.

Downside--price; your talking about a unit thats likely over $1500. Second, there are conditions when thermal can struggle---heavy mist, etc. Not that lights wont also when they basically white out but some nights favors thermal more than others. And if there is snow covering the critter the pic can be hard to decipher as that insulates everything you are looking at.

Its a good tool for the task but not perfect. Truck has both light and thermal 100% of the time

I have a buddy that bought a night vision scope for coyote hunting, works a treat for checking traps. I wouldn't buy one my myself but I'll let him use his

How are you going tell if your trap is tripped or otherwise needs attention?

lol Don’t be paranoid about your trapping activities.

You mentioned night vision then talked about heat signature, night vision and thermal are two different things. Thermal picks up heat regardless if it is day or night, it is generally used at night because of the greater degree of difference between ambient temperature and the temperature of the animal we are looking for in this application.

How well night vision works for the application that you have discussed varies depending on a variety of factors, the first is the quality of the unit, is it traditional night vision or the newer digital night vision. The cheaper traditional night vision is a waste of money, some of the mid level digital night vision is some pretty decent equipment. For 500 or so dollars you can pick up a pretty decent digital unit, now if your sets are more than 100 yards or so away plan on dropping another 200 or so for a better IR illuminator. For all practical purposes a good white light spotlight will accomplish the same thing for way less money but it is not as discreet and doesn't have nearly the cool factor of saying I use night vision to check my traps.

As far as thermal goes, I have no experience with the less expensive units, the thermal that I have used were all very expensive units and worked extremely well. With that said there are a lot of Youtube reviews on the cheaper thermal units, it seems that Wraith, Rattler, and the new DNT combo digital NV/Thermal unit are getting the best reviews of the less expensive units but they are still up around 1000 dollars.

Night vision and thermal are so common now that I would be really surprised if several people around you don't already have units, maybe you could try out some of their stuff and see how it works and maybe that would help you make your decision.

Reminds me of my first... pvs2 ,, if I remember correctly .
That thing could cause more brain damage then a brick phone.

I have one of these cheap IR camaras that adds onto a rifle scope. For the price is great. Popping nusance critters from 20-40 yards is where it really shines. The distance is only as good as the IR flashlight, and you don't have to use the IR flashlight that comes with it. But you're not going to do much at distance. And its basically just black & white version of the what you would see visually. That means animals that blend in during the day will really blend in during the night. If there's any distance the best way to suceed with it is to spot their eyes glowing, then recognize the body shape.

A couple months ago I also got one of these.
The thermal is amazing. There is no comparison to the cheap options. You can spot mamals at hundreds of yards. Warm blooded mamals glow. There is no blending in, or camaflauge. You can clearly see everything for hundreds of yards, and the mamals glow. The picture-in-picture is very helpful. The laser rangefinder is excellent. I put a QD scope mount and have zero points and balistic calculator configured for several guns. With a suppressed 22 its loads of fun. I shot a mouse at 39 yards. The base magnification is extremely important - far more important than how much additional magnification it can do. You need to fully understand the consequences of the base magnification before making a purchase to make sure you get something appropriate for your purpose.

With the cheap IR style options, you may save a little walking, but I don't think you'll save much walking. With a thermal you could easily spot catches 100-200 yards away if you have clear line of sight. Larger mamals can be spotted in a field by very quickly panning across it. Day or night, it makes no difference.

Here's some screenshots of racoons with my thermal. The the focus is off - its capable of better.

As has been already mentioned, night vison and thermal are not equal, you can fine low priced night vison now in most any hunting catalog or forum thats hunting related, just write in night vision, years ago it was the rage, most would serve very well for trapping sets if the animal is moving, throw on a small UV penlight would make them much better though and they are very inexpensive, worked very well for a Russian Sniper scope I over 25 years ago, which I just took off a rifle that I am setting up for my grands to use when they go with me, probably end up setting up another Thermal on that gun as well, as I have for the AR I am currently building up ! But won't buy one as expensive for that set up as I did my AR !

It's what I started with rifle hunting on private bird ranges at night for several bird clubs I was doing predator control on, at that time the cost was equal to what thermal is now, and thermal has come way down the last five or six years due to so many competitors

Night vison will certainly work for you, but not in any way near that Thermal will, you can buy great thermal Oculars for 1 grand or less most any place you find them. I have one that was over that but I paid for it and the features it comes with, it will read through snow, fog, or rain up to a 1000 yards or better away, there are thermal binoculars available as well, but way over a grand in most places, however they will reach out double that if needed, with all usually having a range finder on them, for trapping its a bit much, for dog or or hog hunting could be worth the bother ! I am still in the thinking area about getting a set of binoc's for dog
hunting yet.

You might even just use a High power UV it will reflect in the eyes of the animals they won't try to dodge it until they feel you to close, would be a lot cheaper to start with !

Good Luck, there is nothing like calling or hunting at night where legal and with good equipment !