Originally posted by RockvilleBob That's an impressive rig - did you make custom mounts? Is this a "Wildman Original" design?
Nothing custom about it except for the red dot finder mount .
Although the objectives were custom. Raw fluorite blank from Zeiss (Schott) in Germany, ground and figured by Lomo in Russia, polished, coated and assembled into a final objective cluster by Zeiss in Germany.
Originally posted by RockvilleBob I found a small boat or kayak works well,
I use a canoe pretty much the same way on the Upper Mississippi Wild Life Refuge.
Originally posted by RockvilleBob Either way, getting into position and letting the animals come to you or using a small boat and drifting, involves a lot of time for a few possible pictures. In the case of my Porte-Bote, it is a half hour to one hour getting there by car, a half hour set up and another half hour teardown plus getting on location.
I had a big advantage over most. For 25 years I lived on 62 acres of my own land bounded on two sides by a US wildlife refuge. I knew all the good spots on my land depending on what species I was looking for. So I could go out for a day, set up and shoot and when done just cover the rig up with a big plastic garbage bag and leave it to walk home for supper and a good nights rest and pick up where I left off the next morning. No car needed.
This shoot is the height of roughing it - taken through my kitchen window while I was having coffee at the kitchen table. There he was on the feeder so I just swung the rig around and pulled the trigger.
Tufted Titmouse...