Adaptive Birding Equipment

Birding equipment that may be helpful for birders who experience accessibility challenges is listed below. Links are provided in case you’d like to buy the same equipment for yourself, or for your organization to loan out to visitors. If you know of any more, please contact us and let us know — we’d love to add your ideas to this page so more people can benefit!

Birdability founder Virginia Rose uses a scope mounted on her wheelchair, which leaves both hands free to maneuver her wheelchair, and keeps the scope at the right height for her to see through. Read more about how important it is for her to be independent with a scope in her Birdability Blog post called The Scope.

The individual components used to mount Virginia’s scope are:

• Kupo Super Claw, which attaches directly to the wheelchair;

• Manfrotto 224 Variable Friction Magic Arm with Camera Bracket, which has a movable hinge joint so you can position the scope at the height you need it; and

• Dot Line Ball Head, which attaches to the camera bracket and allows the scope to move left and right, up and down.

An alternative mount is used by Bonnie Lewkowicz, who uses a lightweight monocular (rather than a heavier scope) and this one-piece mount designed for a smartphone. Bonnie uses a power wheelchair, and had a custom handle 3D-printed to allow her to remove the mount from her armrest independently. She notes that with this mount she needs an armrest that is flat underneath so the clamp can be tightened all the way.

For more ideas on mounting binoculars or scopes to wheelchairs and scooters, check out Paul Miller’s blog FSHD Birder. Describing himself as a “birder and tinkerer”, he uses a mounted scope with an electronic focus knob on his power wheelchair due to arm and shoulder weakness as a result of Facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD).

Many folks with mobility challenges, chronic fatigue, chronic pain and other health concerns need rest breaks! Benches aren’t always available, and bringing your own small, lightweight trail chair can be helpful, especially if you enjoy staying in one place and birding from there for a while. There are many different kinds of chairs or stools; we recommend visiting your local outdoor store and trying a few out to see which ones are most comfortable for your body, easiest for you to carry (lightweight? small? what shape do they collapse to?), and allow you to use your binoculars (if you use them).

This light (but bulky when flat) foldable chair from REI allows Birdability Coordinator Freya McGregor to sit on the ground without crossing her legs (difficult due to her ‘dodgy’ knee). Not ideal for carrying down a trail, but helpful in places near a parking area!

Adaptors are available that connect smart phones to binoculars or scopes and are designed for "digiscoping" — taking photos with a camera or smartphone through optics. This may enable someone with a tremor or dyskinesia (from Parkinson’s disease, for example) to look at the large phone screen to see through the binoculars, and not have to line up their eyes perfectly with the binocular lenses, so a head or body tremor wouldn't matter so much.

A tripod or a monopod may be helpful, too, because this stabilizes binoculars and removes the difficulty caused by a tremor from someone’s hands holding them. (A monopod has just one leg, so are often easier to transport or carry on a trail, and less bothersome to set up... but you do need to keep supporting it or it will fall over!) You can get binocular mounts to attach binoculars to tripods; see below for more on these!

Birders with low vision may also benefit from a digiscoping adaptor, especially one used on a scope, for a tablet. The bird will appear much larger on the tablet than if they looked through the scope, which may enable them to see more detail. This set up also allows more people to see the bird at the same time, reducing frustration if the bird flies off before everyone has had a chance to see it!

Novagrade make an adaptor for any scope, and for any tablet (although it is too big to work for smartphones). The folks at Phoneskope make adaptors specifically for certain binocular brands and models, and for specific phone models.

Did you know you can mount most pairs of binoculars to a tripod or monopod? This may be helpful if you have difficulty holding your binoculars steady due to a tremor, or if your hands, arms or shoulders can’t hold the weight of binoculars for as long as you would like. Some people find that mounting binoculars to a short monopod is helpful, so they can easily rest it on the ground, in their lap, or on their wheelchair for stability, or because it's easier to grasp the monopod in one hand rather than holding binoculars in two.

Many pairs of binoculars have a small screw at the far end of the focus wheel. A binocular mount is a small “L” shaped piece of metal or plastic which attaches to that screw, then attaches to the regular tripod or monopod mounting surface. For a review of the different options available, check out this article. The accompanying short video explains these mounts clearly and how to attach them. If your binoculars don’t have this capability, universal binocular mounts (which don’t require any screws) may help, like this one from Zeiss.

Binocular harnesses are better than neck straps for almost any birder out in the field. Birdability’s Occupational Therapist, Freya McGregor, explains that they help spread the weight of binoculars across the back and shoulders, rather than pulling down on the neck. As well as being more comfortable to wear and more secure for your binoculars, this helps our necks and backs in the long term. Harnesses can be easily adjusted, and shorted if you bird from a wheelchair and don’t want your binoculars hanging too low. Learn more about the benefits of harnesses over neck straps in this short video from Freya.

Freya tells us she’s been using her harness for about five years and the elastic hasn’t become overstretched in that time. She says she often uses her harness under her backpack comfortably. She keeps the plastic sliders that adjust the over-the-shoulder straps on the harness closer to the central leather hub (not anywhere near the tops of her shoulders) so she don’t get poked or push on them with her backpack straps. (She says she can’t feel them against her back with her backpack on.)  

Finally, if you’re a wheelchair user you could adjust and shorten the straps so your binoculars sit up high and out of the way of your lap.

For folks who are glare sensitive (perhaps because of an eye condition or a sensory sensitivity), binoculars can be hard to use. Winged eye cups can help block out the light that creeps in the sides of the eye pieces, making it much easier to see birds through the binoculars. Birdability Captain Michael Hurben, who has retinitis pigmentosa, loves this kind.

Birdability Coordinator Freya McGregor’s husband Patrick is a US Army combat veteran. He does not feel comfortable using binoculars out in the field, partly due to how much it restricts his field of view. Instead, he enjoys using a small hand-held scope, as this allows him to keep one eye open. (This also means he can see other birds moving around and can keep track of them more easily than if both eyes had a restricted field of view from using binoculars. Freya tells us this is very handy when they’re birding together!)

For reviews of a variety of compact scopes, have a read of this article. (Note that some of the scopes reviewed were manufactured for hunting or astronomy.)

Jerry Berrier, totally blind birder and panelist during Birdability Week 2020, does a lot of birding from his computer. He has microphones set up in his front and back yards, and listens to the local birds from his desk!

Jerry has two Audio-Technica PRO 44 Cardioid Condenser Boundary Microphones, one mounted under the eves at the front of the house, and one at the back.

• Jerry recommends using a furry wind screen on each microphone, to help with the clarity of the sound and to keep wind interference to a minimum.

• Connecting the microphones to his computer are XLR cables, and he has a little window pass-through to avoid having to drill holes in the walls or leaving a gap of the windows open.

• A Yamaha 12-channel audio mixer provides the 48-volt phantom power needed by the microphones.

• Finally, the output of the mixer is connected to a set of speakers at his desk.

Jerry notes that this set-up may be rather complex for many folks, but he uses the audio mixer for other purposes and so needs this level of complexity.

One more straightforward option is to use a baby monitor set up near your feeders or where ever birds often gather.

Fran Bartle, a birder with a mobility challenge, does a lot of birding (and bird photography) from her mobile bird blind. Her friends used camouflaged fabric, zip ties and heavy-duty tape to cover up much of a golf cart for her.

She uses her Birdmobile to enjoy the golf cart trails around the RV resort where she lives, and says, “I have slowly driven down paths, stopping often to let the birds come close to me. The steering wheel is a great support to steady my camera. Because I spend hours each day birding in this mobile blind, the birds seem to accept me and actually land on branches very close to the path. Many photos are closer and better than those I took while leading bird walks.”

If, like many people, you have some hearing loss or are hard of hearing, we’ve heard great reports from birders about Walker’s Game Ear hearing devices. Designed for hunters, they allow you to change the frequency of the noise you’re hearing yourself, which means folks with high frequency hearing loss (which often accompanies age, especially for men) can tweak the sound coming in… and maybe hear those warblers singing in spring!

Jerry Berrier, totally blind birder and panelist during Birdability Week 2020, uses an Olympus LS14 digital voice recorder, which has a talking menu. He says it’s small enough to fit in his pocket, but very accessible to people who are blind and need screen reader features.

iPhones come with default screen reader software installed (called VoiceOver); the default Voice Memo app can also be used to record birds in the field.

When listening to birds in the field, the free BirdNET app, created by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, shows instant spectrograms of the birds you are listening to, and can identify birds by their calls. (Seeing spectrograms can help some people learn to bird by ear.) BirdNET is compatible with TalkBack (the Android built-in screen reader) and VoiceOver (on iPhones), but the the portion of the screen where you need to "capture" the bird calls is not accessible. Another option is the the SpectrumView app (free; only available for iOS), which allows users to see the spectrograms.

Birding by car is a great way to cover a lot of ground without having to deal with accessible (or inaccessible) trails. Many birders with mobility challenges report that RAM Mounts’ Window Scope and Camera Mount is really helpful for mounting their scope on their car window.

Scopes with straight barrels (rather than scopes with an angled eyepiece) are usually more ergonomically friendly for car birding, as you don’t need to crane your neck or raise your car seat to see through them.

If you can’t get out in nature, bring it to you! There are all kinds of bird feeders, but two stand out as ways to bring the birds as close as possible to you when you’re inside — especially helpful if you aren’t able to get out as often as you might like. Clear feeders that mount directly to your window are great, while the Hegeman View Window Tray Feeder almost brings the birds right into your house! (It’s worth noting this feeder may be best used on windows on the second floor or above, for security reasons.)

There are many companies who make wheelchairs especially for the outdoors. They may have wider tires for better grip on gravel and rocky surfaces, or be entirely made from plastic with super wide wheels to use on sand at the beach. Nature-based organizations might consider purchasing one or two of these wheelchairs to have available for loan (for free!) to visitors, to enable them to access the beautiful places you look after!

Many state parks along the coast have beach wheelchairs available to borrow, including Galveston Island State Park in Texas and Delnor-Wiggins State Park in Florida.

Access Ability Wisconsin have outdoor wheelchairs available for free, all over the state.

Outdoor wheelchair companies we know of include Magic Mobility. Based in Australia, they make off-road power wheelchairs, including a 4x4 model. Their website includes information on available funding in Australia and the US.