After 40+ or so years my PVC-and-cloth blind has reached the end of the trail :(
I'm reasonably handy with sewing machines, scissors, saws and a variety of other tools so instead of buying someone else's idea of a perfect (or, perfectly marketable) blind I'm making my own.
The old blind's biggest drawback was the PVC. It's bulky & cumbersome to carry very far into the field, and the various fittings can be cranky to assemble and disassemble, so the new blind will be based on a free-standing tent, the Eureka Timberline. The Timberline has been in production for decades and repair parts are readily available, it packs down to a reasonable size and weight, and it's modular enough that it can be made bigger or smaller as conditions warrant.
I purchased a used, damaged tent (the floor, which I was going to remove, got melted) which should arrive any day. I've also purchased a number of odds and ends in camo colors to finish the job: ripstop nylon, no-see-um mesh, straps, seam binding, zippers etc. from rockywoods.com
The general plan is to shorten the tent's main spar by removing two of the three pole sections, shorten the rain fly to fit, and add covers at either end. A couple of extra pole sections added to the two removed from the main spar will optionally make the blind's legs longer, and the fabric removed from the rain fly plus the undamaged portion of the tent floor will extend the rain fly to the ground when the longer legs are in use.
The back cover will initially be based on the tent's add-on vestibule. The vestibule has a side-opening zipper and a ventilation hole; it's tempting to try using the ventilation hole for the camera's lens but the there isn't enough visibility around the lens to see the birds. I'll use no-see-em netting at the other end of the blind for the lens.
The bird-end of the blind will be covered with a new section based loosely on the vestibule but it will be made of camo ripstop with a center-opening zipper (two zipper pulls). When this section is open I'll have the no-see-em netting in place to hide the zipper opening, with a hole in the netting for the lens. The hole in the netting will have a draw cord cinched with a cord lock to surround the lens. I'll post photos as the project progresses.
