Bushnell Birder

This is a decent, full-sized, inexpensive birding binocular. It has a good 8-power magnification. It has central focusing. And the optics are surprisingly good for such an inexpensive binocular.

After you move up to the high-end binoculars of your dreams, these will still come in handy as a loaner pair when you take a friend birding for the first time.

Many birders date the beginning of their lifelong interest in birds to the day someone gave them their first binoculars. May we suggest that you be the person to put binoculars in the hands of a young person you care about?

Bushnell Birder 8x40 binoculars

• Close near-focus
• Complete with carrying case and strap
• Extended eye relief (so it works with eyeglasses)
• Great for the budding birdwatcher

Diane says: The Bushnell Birders are not bad beginner binoculars. I bought a half dozen of them to use as loaners for my birding class field trips, and although I have found more compact, better binoculars for the price since then, I was satisfied with them at the time.

A person who wears glasses may not see quite the entire picture with these binoculars. That is because "eye relief," or the optimum distance between the eye and the binocular lens, is 15 mm. Some people's glasses hold the binoculars farther than that from the eyes, so those people can't get close enough to the binoculars to see the whole picture. However, the Bushnell Birders are better than some binoculars on that score. If you don't wear glasses, or if your glasses are small and close to your eyes, you should not have a problem with them.

If your glasses ride farther than 15 mm. from your eyes, you might want to consider a binocular with slightly longer eye relief, such as the Eagle Optics Triumph, which has 18 mm. of eye relief and works for almost any glasses.

A word on alignment. The main thing that causes eye strain in binoculars is that they sometimes get knocked, and then the two telescopes aren't parallel any more. Your eyes struggle to compensate, and you get a headache. Top-quality binoculars costing hundreds of dollars are built sturdier and will withstand more banging around.

These Bushnell Birders need a little gentler handling. You can't toss them around and expect them to stay in alignment. So please, exercise a little care with them.