All fogged up

We are in the thick of the annual moose hunt so I’ll tell you a moose hunting story. Then I’ll get back to rifle scope advice, where I left off last week. Because a good quality optical aiming device is a mighty fine piece of equipment to ensure you don’t mess up when opportunity presents itself.

You never know, that 200yard shot in low light might be the only shot you get for the season. For my part, my eyes aren’t what they used to be when I shot my first moose in 1979. That was a 200-yard offhand across a bog in fog with a simple V-notch sight. I don’t think I could make it now.

Actually, I wouldn’t even try. I’m nowhere near as steady either.

I bought my first scope around 1991, a compact version, and it mounted nicely on the Savage Model 99 that I was shooting at the time.

I’m thinking it was a fixed 4X but I’m not quite sure. It wasn’t very expensive but I’d thought it would serve my purpose just fine. And I got it on a sale. I had much to learn.

The first daylight of moose season revealed a grey ominous looking sky. Robert and I were on Gosse’s Hill overlooking a big open marsh. The area is grown in quite a bit now and isn’t near as good a stand as back then. We fully expected to see a moose and I anticipated having an easy kill with my first scope.

We were just beginning the art of calling moose back then and Rob made a few lonely cow calls to see if he could entice a bull to show himself. It began to rain as the first echo rang in the hills. It poured so we pulled on our rain suits, plain old commercial fishing

clothes back in those days. The wind picked up and it was quite unpleasant.

“Not much chance of seeing a moose out in the open in this drift of rain,” says Rob. “Not too likely,” I responded. Spirits plummeted. We called for an hour or so with zero results. Then we retreated to the woods and lit a fire under a big fir tree. The rain and wind would not deny us our morning tea. The fire crackled and we drank strong black tea to wash down a couple of slices of homemade bread coated with molasses.

Life was good. I never thought much about the scope and how it might fair in the rain. The catalogue said it was waterproof, nitrogen filled, and all that good stuff. Not a problem.

After our mug-up we debated what to do. It wasn’t much of a day for hunting moose. Anyway, we decided to walk slowly in the Grassy Path, calling, waiting a while and then moving on another 100 feet or so.

We’d wait about five minutes before moving and calling again. Rob and I hunted like that for years and harvested quite a few moose. Nowadays we pick a location and stick to it, calling for at least an hour before moving on. Anyway, we were close to the end of Grassy Path and almost ready to give up.

Just as Robert called there erupted a God awful crashing in the woods nearby. A huge bull burst out of a small spruce grove and came trotting towards us. Rob called again and he stopped dead in his tracks, staring straight at us. I raised my trusty .308 with the intention of taking the shot as soon as he turned to make his retreat. He certainly now knew fully well that we were no cow moose and he was in trouble, out in the open and facing us at less than 50 yards. He had to present a broadside shot in order to escape.

This would be easy I thought.

I couldn’t see a bloody damn thing. My new scope was completely water blurred. I pulled out the tail of my plaid shirt from under my raincoat and wiped the lenses. The moose held his position.

Whew, I raised the rifle again. It was still fogged up. It was totally fogged up on the inside. What a bloody fog up.

The dandy big bull turned and walked away. We went home. Rob laughed at me. I decided to learn more about scopes.

For the rest of that season I went back to iron sights and eventually shot a moose.

That year for Christmas I bought myself a Leupold VX3.

It never ever leaked and I still have it. I think it cost around $600 at the time but worth every penny. I hunted with it for many years on my Remington Model 700 in .300 magnum.

That’s a hard-kicking, powerful cartridge and I did lots of shooting. The waterproofing did its duty. Lesser quality scopes tend to leak and fog up after repeated recoil from high-powered rifles. The seals crack and leak. You don’t want that.

I tell people who ask, you are better off spending less on the rifle because just about every shooting iron on the market these days will get the job done in a crunch. A lesser scope might not, and you can have a very bad day. You don’t have to break the bank but really cheap scopes are essentially pure junk.

That said, nowadays you get a decent scope from companies, like Vortex, Nikon, Bushnell, Burris and others for less than $500.

A good rule of thumb is to allow equal dollars for both the rifle and scope. That will work.

By the way, that moose that year was the very last one I shot with iron sights. I still target shoot with iron sights but that’s it. Sorry, I do hunt rabbits and grouse with my .22 levergun, no optics. Although I’ve used a red dot a few time and it’s deadly.

I’d love to hear from you about your scope experiences.