Hearing protection

[Gander]

I had electronic hearing protection at one time. The only complaint is keeping batteries in them. I literally shoot every day so changing batteries gets to be a pain. Sitting out hunting for hours burns more battery power. I finally settled on custom fit ear plugs. I just get a new set about every 6 months which runs about $50. When I'm hunting I just give one a quarter turn so I can hear normal conversation. When it looks like birds are working I just reach up and pop it back in. Simple and easy. Most of my hearing damage came from the Marines and being young and too cool. Never wore ear plugs while hunting. That was dumb but it was also a different time. This was before kids wore helmets and knee pads to ride bikes and skateboards.

Take care of your hearing whatever you do.

[FULLCHOKE]

I spent the money on Tetras, I liked them but I just cant use them for hunting. It sounds too fake, like sound through a TV. When walking small sounds are amplified too much: you hear the swishing of your pants, the panting of your dog, small little clicks with your gun, a whistle rattling, and the biggest thing I couldn't get over was that my sense of direction was thrown off. IMO they were just kind of annoying. I rely on my ears a lot to hear flushing birds and switched to a pair of high fidelity ones that reduce I think around 20db. Cheap pair off Amazon called Downbeats. They're great, can still hear little sounds decently, still have a great sense of direction, and the muffle a gun shot well. I wouldn't recommend them for a lot of high volume shooting or sitting in a duck blind next to other guns, use custom molded for that. I wear them day to day at work too, they're pretty discrete.