Who’d be a rabbit? Just about everything wants to kill you. If it’s not foxes looking for dinner, then its horse owners who don’t like the holes you dig in their paddocks and call in a bloke with an airgun.
It’s always been like that. Not that rabbits are completely defenceless; instincts developed over thousands of years have helped ensure the survival of the species.
Now though, if you’re a rabbit, things have just got a whole lot tougher thanks to the launch of two new digital optics products from Nocpix.
Distributed in the UK by Hawke Optics, the Nocpix Nite Pro (£999) is the world’s first 8K digital day/infrared night scope. And if that wasn’t enough, the company has also launched a couple of multi-spectrum binoculars – the Nocpix OMNIH35R, which is priced at £2,499 and the OMNI L19R (£1,499).
Thanks to a huge 8000x6000 sensor that delivers four times as many pixels as a 4K scope, the Nite Pro is the new standard for night vision shooting. The OMNI H35R also uses an 8K sensor for the daytime colour and infrared modes, and a 640x512, 12 micron, 15 NETD thermal sensor.
Below: Nocpix’s 8K NitePro scope and OMNI H35R multi-spectrum binoculars boast some of the highest specifications for digital day and night hunting optics
To find out just how much harder Nocpix’s deadly duo will make life more challenging for rabbits, I took them with me on a trip to one of my paddock permissions.
They may look fluffy and cute, but by digging holes, few creatures pose a bigger threat to horses than rabbits. Rachel, the owner of the paddocks, understands this better than most, having lost a horse a few years ago that had to be destroyed after breaking a leg in a hole dug by a rabbit.
The challenge is that, despite being a relatively small permission, the paddocks sit in the middle of a larger packet of land owned by someone else. As a result, there’s an endless conveyor belt of rabbits waiting to replace the ones I shoot.
On the plus side, although I don’t have permission to shoot on the surrounding land, the owner is happy for me to use it as a fall out zone for shots I take. As a result, I’d paired the Nocpix NitePro with a 90 ft/lbs .30 calibre FX Impact MkII. I hoped the extra range would not only mean I could keep movement to a minimum but also test the NitePro’s image quality at ranges beyond those I’d take on with a sub 12 ft/lbs rifle.
Arriving in the last hour or so of daylight, I parked up in the yard and set myself up at the back of the truck. The Impact’s magazine takes 23 pellets and having not shot it for a while, the 44.75 grain JSB Exact Diabolos looked as big as thumbs.
The Nocpix OMNI H35R comes with a ‘bino-bra’ harness that prevents the binoculars from swinging around when walking and ensures they are instantly at hand when you need them.
An old beanbag cushion completed my gear; the paddocks have plenty of fences and placing the bean bag on top of them makes an ideal gun rest.
As it was still light, I scanned the paddocks with the OMNI binos on colour day mode. The 8K sensor not only ensures a crystal-clear picture, but all those pixels minimise image deterioration at higher magnification.
Thanks to the tech, I spotted two rabbits cropping the grass in the next paddock over and used the OMNI’s laser rangefinder to confirm the distance at just over 120 metres.
Below top: Nocpix OMNI binoculars have a shoulder harness that keeps them exactly where needed while you hunt hands-free
Below bottom: Rich scans for rabbits with a sweep of the Nocpix OMNI binoculars
The FAC-rated FX Impact is capable of long-range sniping, but not that long range. Fortunately, the rabbits were the other side of the horse jumping arena and making use of some equipment that had been left there, I closed the gap until I reached the fence and re-lasered the rabbits.
I placed the beanbag on the top rung of the fence and rested the rifle on it. Pushing the top left button on the NitePro activated its laser range finder to show a shot of exactly 50 metres. I’d zeroed the scope to 40 metres, and the ballistic calculator provided a revised aimpoint that incorporated just over an inch of holdover.
I’m lucky enough to have 4K IR scopes from several different manufacturers and love using them all. However, as I peered through the 8K NitePro, the improved picture clarity, sharpness and detail was instantly apparent, even in the low light of dusk and at 13x magnification.
A fraction later, the pellet was on its way. The rabbit was still nibbling on the grass when it struck. Killed, it made half a hop forward then laid still.
Below: Rich presses the ranging button and the NitePro immediately shows a revised aim-point for a long-range rabbit
Glancing up, there was just enough light for me to spot the second rabbit that had retreated a little closer to the hedgerow but was still above ground. Cranking the FX Impact’s side lever, I shuffled to my left a little and lined up for another shot.
This time the Nite Pro’s laser range finder indicated the distance at 46 metres and 1.3 cm of holdover. However, when I squeezed off the shot, the pellet flew wide and I could quite clearly where it struck a fence post to the left of the rabbit’s head.
For some reason, the rabbit froze, allowing me enough time to chamber another pellet and take my time to ensure the follow up flew straight and true, hitting home with a solid ‘whump’.
There are plenty of foxes on the permission, and it’s rare for a session to pass without me seeing one, but I decided to leave the two rabbits where they fell as retrieving them would have meant tromping too close to the warren.
Back at the truck, I attached my PBiR-X illuminator and prepared to shoot on in the dark by putting the NitePro into ‘Moon’ mode – the first option revealed by short press on the menu button on the top turret. The scope gives the option of yellow and green night vision palettes, but I stuck with traditional monochrome.
Making my way across the paddocks again, I stopped to scan ahead with the OMNI binoculars, this time in full thermal mode. Once more, a pair of rabbits revealed themselves, this time in the bottom right-hand corner of the field around 80 metres away.
I moved forward to another handily placed fence and lined up for another shot rested on my beanbag. The rabbits were slightly blurry but a quick adjustment of the focus control, which is conveniently located on the top turret, brought the image into sharp relief.
This time the NitePro’s laser rangefinder indicated a shot at the right-hand rabbit of 63 metres, which the ballistic calculator translated into a shade over nine cm of holdover.
Pre-occupied by chomping on the grass, I had to give the rabbit a squeak in the hope it would lift its head. The rabbit obliged and, placing the red dot of the revised aimpoint on its head, was rewarded by another clean as a whistle kill.
Once again, the second rabbit froze in place, and once again I missed with my second shot, but this time the bunny didn’t hang around to give me another chance.
Below: Scanning the fields with the OMNI's thermal mode reveals more than just rabbits - and also shows the surrounding landscape in sharp detail to assist with safe shooting
Given the relatively small size of the permission, I generally tend to get just one pass through. That last rabbit had been right at the end of the paddocks, so I decided to hang around to see if any more appeared.
I spent the time fiddling with the OMNI binoculars, going through the different colour palettes and testing the laser range finder against different landmarks. The OMNI also has a ballistic calculator function which, if your scope doesn’t have the same feature, provides the information needed so you can make the adjustment manually.
A short press on the top right button cycles through the day and thermal modes. The OMNI’s ‘multi-spectrum’ descriptor refers to the fact that there is a third, infrared mode. With the ‘moon’ function selected and the IR illuminator turned on to one of three different levels of brightness, I scanned the field again. This time a pair of eyes blinked back at me.
They belonged to another rabbit that had appeared 46 metres ahead and stared directly at me. I dropped the OMNI to my chest and shouldered the FX Impact. The NitePro’s laser range finder confirmed the range, or 1.3 cm of holdover, and bunny number four slumped on its side from a 44.75 grain pellet between the eyes.
I’d pretty much decided that would be my last shot of the night but out of habit gave the field a final scan through the OMNI binoculars. I flicked back to thermal mode and was glad I had because one of the many benefits of thermal technology is that it can see quarry partially obscured to the naked eye or infrared by long grass and light scrub.
As I swept down the hedgerow, I could clearly see the ghostly thermal outline of another rabbit sat in the long grass. Knowing exactly where to look, I swapped to the rifle and the NitePro picked out the rabbit sat right on my 40 metre zero.
It was a good way to end as the fifth rabbit of the night perfectly demonstrated how lethally effective a thermal spotter, IR scope and top-of-the range rifle could be when dealing with pests.
Below: Combined with Rich's rock-steady shooting position and the high-power Impact, the Nocpix Nite Pro proved highly effective on the paddock rabbits
Sitting here now and recounting the experience of that trip, I find myself strangely conflicted. The OMNI Multi-Spectral binoculars are an amazing piece of kit. The thermal performance will easily mix it with similarly priced thermal spotters, and of course they offer the additional benefit of that staggering 8K digital day time and IR mode.
The Nocpix Nite Pro not only takes digital shooting optics to a new level but will hold its own against all but the best glass scopes. And, of course, unlike glass, it has the added benefit of a crystal-clear night mode and a plethora of additional features and functions, not least the laser range finder and ballistic calculator.
I keep coming back to the same conclusion, and that is that 4K digital scopes are quite adequate for day and night-time shooting with an air rifle. But the 8K Nocpix Nite Pro is simply better. In fact, I’d have to say that right now, it’s the best on the market.
Article first published September 30th 2026
