Who really needs 15y parallax?

Exactly so, but maybe you would have to go all the way down to 5x if you want a clear site under 20 yards. But really - do anyone need 30x (or x20 for that matter) for targets under 30 yards?
I think there is a lot of good scope options out there who gets the thumb down because of this "minimum-parallax-hysteria". just my 2 norske kroner.

I have shot a lot of cottontail rabbits at 15 yards or less. You can also get very close to pigeons closer then 15 yards inside barns when they are roosting. Most of my ground squirrels I got were less then 20 yards and I have shot several at 8 to 10 yards. At these close distances, I have my zoom at the lowest power setting

"wyshadow"I have shot a lot of cottontail rabbits at 15 yards or less. You can also get very close to pigeons closer then 15 yards inside barns when they are roosting. Most of my ground squirrels I got were less then 20 yards and I have shot several at 8 to 10 yards. At these close distances, I have my zoom at the lowest power setting

Click to expand...

I second that-many of my rabbits are at 8-10 yards in heavy cover, it's nice to clearly see the vital area. In the case of my .25 which is used for longer range stuff, it isn't necessary.

I only buy scopes with a 10-15yard minimum parallax. Though I focus most of my shooting at 30yards and further, I do a lot of pesting around 15 yards. Even tree squirrels many times require a close shot. For hunting, I rarely take the scope off 10x. Having a scope that will parallax down allows me to keep my power at 10x.

I find the need for low parallax even more important when night hunting.

I run into this quite often while on a walkabout pesting session. Though I prefer a 30 yard or greater shot these critters sometimes pop up right next to me, so a low yardage parallax is a must on a rifle with no open sights available. I've begun carrying a 1322 with iron sights with me on my walks just so I don't have to quickly change my scope settings for a close up shot.

Field target shooters need parallax down to 10 yards.

Rabbits, Birds, Snakes and Rats!

Thurmond

For shooting squirrels off the bird feeder 5 yards away Mine doesn't go rifle scopes don't go 10 yards (well) so I've been using my 10M pistols to do the job.

You've hit on my 'bette noir' here :-(

Parallax is NOT Focus.

Focus (or minimum Focus) is the ability to resolve or clearly see detail at 'x' range

Parallax is the mis alignment within 3 things / planes - Human Eye, Reticle or Target Object and it rarely occurs in modern rifle scopes, (early AO or front mounted ranging scopes used fairly crude threads for the 'AO' lens to travel upon which could cause the Object AO lens to wobble about in its forward or backward movement).


IMO - an air rifle is useful within the 12 - 45 yard range (I'm in the UK and talking about 12 FPE, above 12FPE I would only extend that range to approx 60 yard*). Above those ranges a Rimfire or further out a Centrefire rifle is needed (IMO !). That's just my idea about the 'rifle capabilities'.

Scope capabilities are what we are talking about:

Scope A - capable of resolving detail / focussing at 12 yards out to 200 yards (scopes also have range limits folks!)
or
Scope B - capable of blah/blah ( ) at 30 yards out to 400 yards.


As the 'Pesters' have said above, for airgun use it's better to have a clear sighting image well below 30 yards OR the minimum possible distance you would take a clean kill.


*We dont have large critters to deal with and a clean shot is imperative.

Squirrels on birdfeeder 11yrds.

I sometkmes need short range capability for chipmunk pest control in the garden. They are tiny and fast so the closer the better. It's about 10 yards from my window to the spot where they like to dig holes in my lawn. 

I don't enjoy short range for target practice or regular hunting though. It's just for pest control. 

As long as my scopes go down to 25 yards and are parallax free I'm good . But I sold a rifle few weeks back to a guy up north that does mini-sniper at 10 yards . So for that I could see it .
Down here there really aren't any indoor shooting ranges to speak of and almost all our ranges start at 25 yards or meters and go out from there .
My main shooting buddy INSISTS his scopes focus / parallax free at 10 yards even though he NEVER shoots less than 25 yards . And honestly 2 of my favorite airgun scopes ( Leupold 4-12 and fixed 12) don't focus down below 20 yards or so . To me its a useless feature to shop for

The thing nowadays is most people want their equipment to be designed to their use or application. . I for one want a scope to go down to 10 yards, but rarely shoot less than 25. But the rare occasion I do, I think I need it. The funny thing for years I used regular high-power rifle scopes on my air guns & .22RF and killed just as many squirrels as I do today. All of them were 100 yard parallax. I think a lot has to do with the information age we now live in. Especially these forums. When I was young I bought whatever the gun shop had, or something used from one of my friends. Now I am nearly tormented , especially when buying scopes. It is nice to have great equipment & as my eyes get dimmer the right scope sure as is nice.

The thing is Nutcracker...
When experienced shooters, like your self, start using phrases like 'All of them were 100 yard parallax' we could enter into a whole new UNREAL world.

The situation you are talking about is Minimum Focus.


And quite how you were able to make those closer range kills...

remains a mystery, given that your scope could not FOCUS fully at those lower ranges.

BRS, On lower power its not as bad as you think. Replicating the exact cheek weld & head position is more critical. In the early 1970s, They seemed very clear to me then. I was happy to have a scope. I never heard of parallax. My father, grandfather, uncles & cousins never used a scope. I was the first person in my family to buy a scope was a K-4 weaver. Heck they never had enough money to buy one, if they would have desired to do so. . I can still hit a squirrel in the head nearly every shot to about 35 yards or so. with my 85 year old .22rf using the tang peep. Well the last time I took it out I could. But back to the thread, yes I like 15 yard parallax. I will take all the advantages/help I can get.

My indoor basement range is 10meters so 10.9 yards. I can do more target shooting there than outside. My eyes suck. I purposely only purchase scopes that will focus down to 10 yards so I can plink when I want. When I go outside to shoot longer distance, turn up the side focus wheel to what is needed. My pesting ranges from 10 yards to 80 yards. 15yards wouldnt work for my shooting.

Different strokes for different folks. ;-)

"Michael"
Say I've got a scope 5-30x50 with minimum parallax of 30 yards. Doesn't that mean that I should be able to use 30x magnification all the way down to 30 yards?

So if I wanted to shoot 20 yards or less couldn't I just lower the magnification to say 10x or 20x and still have a clear site picture?

Click to expand...

Does it work like that? Im still kinda new to higher end airgunning and optics. 

Would be great tbh, I been looking at some mid/higher tier scopes but most paralax to 30-45 yards and I feel like that is a no go for times when local birds needs some lead to the head at usually 10-20 meters.

That said, I would never use 30x at 10-20 meters. 6 is kinda my go to for short range pesting. 

I think some folks are still confusing parallax with focus, so I'm going to post a link to what I think is an OK video on this The above is long distance parallax, but for this post we are talking about parallax at the other end (up close).

Here is an actual test you can do with your scope:

a) Unload your gun
b) Point the at something maybe 30-50 yards out (adjust the side wheel if you have one).
c) Move your eye slightly up and down and side to side across the scope until you loose the scope picture. At the extremes, your eye will be far enough out of line with the scope that you'll loose the scope picture, but the cross hairs should not be "moving" on the target if you scope is parallax free at that distance.
d) Point the gun at something 5 or 7 yards . Depending on scope it may or may not be a clear picture, but that is ok. 
e) Repeat step c, but watch for the scope hairs "moving" up and down and right to left across your target as you move your eye. Do your cross hairs float over the target?
No? You likely have little or no parallax at that distance.
Yes? You now can see Parallax for your scope. If your eye isn't consistently in the same location for each shot, your POI is going to float around on the target. You can continue to point at object slightly farther away to see where parallax is minimized (or goes away) for your scope.

If you found this made the subject clearer (cough) I'd be happy to take a +1 accuracy.