Digiscoping Sparrows! - 20 Oct 2013

I ran out to Crosswinds Marsh this morning to test out the new Digidapter™ digiscoping adapter that is being marketed to Zeiss Diascope owners having the Vario D 15-56X/20-75X Zoom Eyepiece.  I've written a review of the adapter on my Digiscoping Blog, along with a review of the 20-75X Zoom eyepiece, itself.  Both have me excited to start a new chapter in digiscoping.

I didn't have much time to bird this morning, so I headed directly from the parking lot to the power lines  located next to Haggerty Rd. and Arkona Rd. Things were a bit quiet, with only American Robins moving in small flocks from tree to tree.  But just as I arrived a few sparrows popped out of the grass and onto the tower structure about 30' away.

I swung the scope around and focused on the first bird, a Lincoln's Sparrow!  It posed long enough for me to slide the adapter over the eyepiece and fire off a dozen photos before it took off.

It was immediately replaced by a pair of White-crowned Sparrows.  They too, posed for several moments and allowed some nice portraits.  I had the scope eyepiece at 20X and the Nikon V1 at 18 - 30 mm for equivalent focal lengths of 1388 - 2300 mm!

Since they were being so cooperative I tried zooming the scope to 75X with the Nikon V1 at 30 mm for a whopping 6075mm focal length!  Hand-held, no less!

The birds flew off, and I headed back to the car after only about 30 minutes in the field. What a great start to my field-testing of this new Digidapter™!