fall. In all my years of upland hunting, I have yet to see a pheasant that waits for a shooter to shoulder his or her gun and yell “pull” before flushing. Even when hunting behind world-class pointing dogs, wild birds are still surprising. During the first round of testing
while wearing the Shoulder Saver™ shirt with the obligatory T-shirt worn over to hide my aforementioned De- vito-like physique, I had absolutely no problems shouldering the gun. As with the rifle shooting on June prairie dogs, I found the effect on my length of pull to be negligible. This having been my first round of scattergun shooting since December 2011, it was very good to get out and “knock the rust off” while test- ing the Shoulder Saver™. Even though the score reflected my lack of practice, it was still good to get out shooting and a great time was had by all at a fantastic facility. Round two yielded a score very similar to the first round of shooting, although the second round of clays was far less comfortable. From a subjective standpoint, it was simply much more comfortable to shoot while wearing the Shoulder Saver™ shirt. I noticed definite soreness in my shooting shoulder by the end of the round. OBJECTIVITY
While the differences between the pictures are subtle, there definitely is light bruising that took place during the second round of shooting, while the first round picture shows none. I acknowledge that it is possible that the cumulative effect of shooting two rounds back-to-back, even with the Shoulder Saver™ in place for the first round, may have had some slight impact on the bruising of my shoulder. I’ve shot enough rounds of Sportys in the past to know that impact to be negligible. Both rounds were shot with the same gun, the same rounds, and the only difference was the presence of the Reactar™G2™ between my shoulder and that hard plastic butt plate. The Browning Shoulder Saver™ shirt can be found on Browning’s web- site for $85.00, and at other retailers online for typically less than that. BOTTOM LINE
This shirt made both my rifle and shotgun shooting more comfortable. From my perspective, more comfortable shooting means more accurate shooting. This shirt makes a difference even for
light-recoiling guns that simply may be shot at high volumes. I found this shirt to be very effective for both rifle and shotgun shooting, and quite simply an absolute must for heavy recoil guns for shoulder preservation. Given the price we fork out for guns, ammunition, sup- plies, gas, food, and other expenses, this shirt is well worth the cost. This shirt will be a part of my gear bag on every gunning trip from here on out, and when this one wears out, I’ll happily go and fork out my hard-earned cash for a new one. Perhaps by then I’ll look a bit more like Arnold Schwarzenegger and a bit less like Danny Devito and may be able to wear it without a T-shirt over it. Most likely not, but I’ll keep trying. FIELD TEST:
BUSHNELL FUSION 1600 ARC BINOCULAR/RANGEFINDER
The Summer 2012 issue of The Varmint Hunter Magazine® included a fine review by John Antanies of this same rangefinding binocular. Given my positive experience with the field test of this unit, I’ll provide another review that I’ll take in a slightly different direction that I think will prove a useful review in addition to his. Bushnell was kind enough to provide me a 12x50 Fusion for test- ing purposes, and given my previous experience with typical 4x monocular rangefinders, I was eager to get the unit into the field for some real-world test- ing. Ranging very small critters in field
shooting conditions with low-power magnification has proven problematic for me in the past, often with ranges varying widely while ranging the same target multiple times. Bushnell certainly isn’t the first manufacturer to marry full-featured binoculars with rangefinding function- ality, but they definitely are leading the way with a high-quality full-featured product at a very attractive price point. For me, rangefinding binoculars from most of the competing companies are simply out of reach because of their high cost. Bushnell’s Fusion units are available in 10x42 or 12x50. For my testing purposes, I requested the 12x50 unit knowing that we would be ranging dogs out past 500 yards, and the greater magnification definitely proved useful. Features include premium fully multicoated optics, BaK-4 prisms, RainGuard® HD anti-fog coating and a fully waterproof design. Other range- finding features include a range of up to 1,600 yards, Bushnell’s ARC (Angle Range Compensator), Bulls-Eye, Scan, and Brush modes, as well as both Bow and Rifle modes. The rifle mode also includes some nifty features such as ballistic tables for common loads giv- ing the shooter hold-over points, and similar functionality that can be used during rifle sight-in sessions. The unit’s display also is adjustable for brightness, a very useful and well-designed feature that yielded mixed results, depending
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