Suggestions for a sight to shoot during the night.

[EddieWalker]

At 2:30 this morning, a coyote must have hit the hot wire close to my house. It was probably the loudest yelping I have ever heard from one of them, and it went on and on and on. I grabbed my cordless spotlight and AR15 with a scope on it and went outside to see if I could find it. I heard it, and it kept out of range from me, but kept on yelping for close to half an hour. We went down several of my roads before it quieted down and disappeared. I never saw it, just heard it.

During all this, I stopped a few times to practice aiming through my scope and holding the spotlight. It would have been pure luck if I hit anything. It was a horrible way to do this.

I've seen flashlights that attach to AR's, but wonder how far the range is? My guess is that it would be good for close quarters, but not out in the woods. My scope is a Nikon P223, which is great during daylight hours. I really like it.

Is there a light or something that will work on the rifle that will allow me to see through the scope?

Or should I look at getting another AR with something designed for night use? And what would be some good suggestions for shooting during the dark of night?

And for those wondering, yes, it is legal to shoot certain animals here during the night. Hogs and coyotes are both legal to shoot 24/7 every day of the year.

 

[adventure bob]

I have found that night shooting is done best with a night scope or NVGs. Problem with regular optics is that they rely an ambient light. Night owl has some decent stuff at cabelas or other onlines. If you don't do it often that may be the way to go due to price. If your no kidding going to hunt at night or want the home perimeter protection factor, Id get a dedicated night scope

 

[CalG]

I hunted 'coons with dogs "back in the day'. Fond memories of that!

For close work, the best I found for night shooting was open iron sights and a powerful penlight held by the hand on the fore grip. The idea being to get some light up on the front sight blade or bead, and enough light at the target to get the eyes to glow. That doesn't take a lot of light, so you don't get blinded. One needs to adapt to scotopic vision and stay that way to do anything in the dark.

Might be something similar could work with a scope, but I'm keeping my money on the irons.
I've just been running through the set up lately. The smell of skunk was thick in the air night before last.
Nothing last night however. Whew! (not Pew!)

 

[sea2summit]

Thermal is best but they are spendy.
Night vision is awesome if you have an IR laser.
Cheap is a red dot sight, shoot with both eyes open and your light.

 

[Oldtink]

You might want to take a look through a 1.5-6 x 40mm or so with a heavy German 3P#4 recticle . They are not cheap but truly impressive in low light on 1.5 power.
Burris Euro Diamond Rifle Scope 3mm Tube 1.5-6x 4mm Illuminated

 

[k0ua]

Cheap is a red dot sight, shoot with both eyes open and your light.

This is what I use. Works for me. I have an old Aimpoint. Turn it down to setting 1 is about right in full darkness. I use a 1 watt Led no name flashlight. Yes, both eyes open. If the flash light was mounted on the firearm that would be even better, but I have done pretty good with just holding it along the forearm.

 

[MossRoad]

Don't know if this would work for you or not, but I was watching a video of someone shooting rats at night in England with air rifles.

First, watch this video.....

 

[MossRoad]

Then see this tutorial on how she made her night vision scope....

Pretty da* impressive and quite the ethical hunter.

 

[MossRoad]

She's pretty serious....

 

[Argonne]

I have an ATN X-Sight. It's not a perfect product yet, but way cheaper than the actual image intensifier based models. There are numerous videos on youtube showing how they work.

We are close enough that I could probably give you a demo some evening if the price hasn't scared you away by then.