Subject: birding with contact lenses?
Date: May 7 11:33:58 1996
From: David Wright - dwright at u.washington.edu


Tweets,

I am wondering if any of you have first-hand experience birding with
contact lenses. I recently acknowledged that I am becoming a tad
nearsighted and purchased eyeglasses (gulp). With glasses on, distant
things *are* sharper, and I can ID some quasi-distant birds that I had
to usethe bins on before. But using bins with eyeglasses is just not
going to work -- the view just isn't as good (even having good eye
relief) as having your eyeballs jammed right up next to the oculars.

But what about using contact lenses when out in the field all day (I see
better for reading, close work without the glasses, so full-time contacts
are impractical)? Do contacts in any way compromise the view through
bins? (It is at least conceivable that the optical quality of contacts
is less than perfect.) I am wondering if I will be better off using my
naked eyes in the field and squinting at the distant stuff, or using
contacts and having better distance vision (with the condition that
any compromise of quality of view in bins is unsatisfactory). If
contacts do work well, is any particular kind (e.g., hard vs. soft) best
(or worst) for this application? Insights of anyone having experience
with this would be a major help (by direct e-mail if you think this is
not a question of general interest).

David Wright
Seattle, WA
dwright at u.washington.edu