Many hunters and shooters are among his clients who need hearing aids. But hearing loss can be prevented, even when sportsmen aren’t in the deer woods or at the trap range, he explained.

A few shots per season aren’t the major risk—it’s the year-around blasts of practice rounds, the whine of chainsaws, snow blowers and every other high-volume device.
“I understand the reality of hunting,” said Thelen of Audiology & Hearing Services, himself a former hunter. “Outside of those two shots, do everything you can to protect your hearing in between.”

Hunters face a unique hearing dilemma: They must be able to hear the soft footfalls of approaching deer or other game, yet need ear protection when they fire a high-powered rifle or other high-decibel firearm.

A few shots per year in the deer woods may not by themselves make a hunter go deaf, but every time a person exposes himself to noise above about 85dB, the cumulative effects contribute to hearing loss, he said.

Kevin Ward of Markesan isn’t a big fan of hearing protection, saying he even shoots trap without it.

“I never wear any protection during hunting, but I do if I am sighting in my rifles,” Ward said. “I occasionally wear them when I trap shoot, but not too often. I will probably regret it when I get older.”

It is true that some people are less susceptible to hearing loss than others, but nobody is immune to it.

“Some people truly believe they are tougher than the next guy,” Thelen said. “The ear isn’t. Overexposure to noise is going to rob us of our hearing. When you lose hearing, it almost never comes back.”

To understand hearing loss, we first must understand the dynamics of hearing.
Noises of all kinds create airborne sound waves that create pressure as they enter the ear, he explained. The eardrum and ossicles (tiny bones called the hammer, anvil and stirrup) turn this pressure into mechanical energy, which in turn create hydraulic energy in the fluid of the cochlea, a snail-shaped organ in the inner ear. Rows of hair cells are then stimulated and the vibrating hairs create sensorineural signals that transfer sounds to the brain via the auditory nerve.

A gunshot or other loud noise creates a temporary threshold shift—a temporary hearing loss that normally returns within a few seconds or minutes. But continued exposure to loud noises damages the rows of microscopic hair cells.

“Once we lose hair cells, hearing is lost,” Thelen said.

He likened it to someone with hardening of the arteries. It’s not one or two fast-food burgers that are to blame, but years of eating a high-fat diet.

The high-frequency sounds are typically the first to be lost, since all sounds entering the ear first pass over the nerves responsible for high-frequency transmission. They in effect are less protected than the nerves responsible for low-frequency transmission.

As we gradually lose our hearing, we don’t notice it, Thelen explained, because we still hear the sound of a human voice, for example. Vowels are generally spoken as low-frequency sounds (for example, the “aw” sound in “thaw”) and can be spoken louder, but the consonant sounds (like the “th” in “thaw”) are high-frequency sounds that can’t be spoken louder.

Thus a person with a high-frequency hearing loss can’t tell the difference between “thaw,” “raw” and “law.” This is why many people who begin to lose their hearing believe other people are simply mumbling, Thelen said.

Tinnitus, or ringing in the ears, is another sign of hearing loss. But it doesn’t have to be a clear ringing sound, noting his own hearing loss from a combination of working around wood chippers, military service and hunting.

“Mine happens to sound like a field of a million crickets,” he said.

Preventing hearing loss is easy and convenient for target shooters. Those who shoot trap, for example, wear earmuffs or earplugs while shooting. But hunting calls for specialized devices that allow normal sounds to be heard while “clipping” or otherwise dampening the high-decibel sounds of gunfire.

One type of electronic-style earmuff, sold by many companies, electronically clips the peaks of sounds, he said. The Walker’s Game Ear muffs, for example, can be adjusted to allow normal sounds to enter and can even be set to amplify the sounds of approaching game.

When a loud noise such as a gunshot enters the speakers outside the muffs, it is temporarily silenced with the electronic clip.

Another style of muff, commonly used in aircraft communications, reproduces the same repetitive sound (such as the drone of an engine) but out of phase with that sound to create a noise-canceling effect.

In-the-ear plugs that mold to the outer contours of the ear generally do not seal as well as rollup-style plugs that fit tightly in the ear canal, or as well as muff-style protection, Thelen said.

Ear plugs with a mechanical valve or filter that are supposed to allow normal sounds to pass while filtering loud noises generally are ineffective, he noted.

“With everything that’s out there, you can find something to wear,” he said.

Jesse Schiltz of Neenah, an avid shooter with personal hearing loss, recommends using both earplugs and ear muffs simultaneously for maximum protection.

Most of his hearing loss is the result of 20 years in the Navy, working on submarines.

High-frequency steam noises and continuous noises below 75 dB contributed to his hearing damage.

“My ears constantly ring,” he said.

For hunters, he recommends the Walker’s Game Ears as a solution to still being able to hear approaching game, but noted even the best hearing protection only reduces the loud sounds by 20 to 30 dB.

“They’ll stop the major damage,” Schiltz said.

A magnum rifle such as a 300 or 7mm Magnum produces around 130 dB, so even with protection, the ears will still receive about 100 dB of pulse noise, which can damage hearing even with just a few exposures, Schiltz said.

His daughter, Shila, 14, was born with profound hearing loss and requires hearing aids, so Schiltz is particularly conscious of hearing problems.

Although most hearing loss comes from years of exposure to loud noises, some extremely loud noises can cause instant and permanent hearing loss. Muzzle brakes on firearms, which are vented to reduce recoil, can create blasts that may cause permanent hearing loss with one exposure.

He noted one of his clients suffered such a loss while seated at a target range near someone shooting a rifle with a muzzle brake.

Most people who begin to lose their hearing need a reason to take action, either in protecting their remaining hearing or to enhance their damaged hearing with hearing aids.

For some, it might be the inability to hear the phone ring, or perhaps the playful whisper of a grandchild. For a hunter, it might be the soft crunch of a deer’s approaching steps.

Whatever the reason, once hearing is lost, 99.99 percent can’t be restored, Thelen said.

The solution is to protect your ears when running a snow blower, mowing, attending a rock concert or working in a noisy environment, so your hearing stays sharp when hunting, he said.

And if you want to avoid exposure to gunfire altogether, Thelen advised: “Take up bowhunting.”

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