After I had my 2^nd pair of Nikon Monarch Binoculars replaced due to breaking the eyepieces I knew I had to find a way to take better care of my binoculars. I am a big fan of carrying binoculars on a harness. It spreads the weight out, doesn’t put stress on your neck, prevents the binoculars from flopping, and still keeps them in a place that makes using them easy. When it’s cold I keep my binoculars zipped inside my coat and that protects them very well but in warmer weather they take a lot of abuse. The problem is that when I carry my binoculars on a harness they pick up all kinds of dirt, mud, dust, pine needles, sagebrush, etc in the eyepieces. Not only is this hard on the lenses but it is really tough on the pullout eyepieces. They don’t tend to work well when full of grit. I have also found that the harnesses allow the binoculars to hit you in the sternum pretty hard if you get too active.