binos will not really provide enough mag at 1.5km, 20x80 lightweight would be ok up to nearly 1km i reckon
HOW MUCH detail do you need to see?
whats best is to try some different binos/scopes ? where are you located? here is some advice - keep in mind everyone has a slightly different preference
on a recent trip to the US i took my 90mm maksutov cassegrain, i was viewing a grizzly a mile away feeding on a bison carcass - i could see detail in the fur, its eye, its breath on the cold morning & the 2 ravens under its belly trying to pick at scraps. i had this at 75x magnification.
the guy next to me had a swarovski spotting scope ($3000) & at 60x - he was struggling to see what i could though his view was a little crisper.
a maksutov spotting scope is the best value imo, though the fixed power ep's give crisper views. Andrews Communication use to have a 70mm mak at a great price with fixed power but its no longer available
a refractor spotting scope has a shorter focal length & its much harder to push up the magnification-they show deficiencies in the cheaper eyepieces more than the maksutov due to there shorter focal length
here is a link to what i have
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Meade-ETX-Mak...#ht_1281wt_883, though its difficult to mount - here is something similar
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/1200-90-Seben...item4cf23e1ece
these are outside Oz, if you look up
www.andrewscom.com.au - goto telescopes, then celestron - at the bottom there are some spotting scopes, a few of which are maksutov's - also this other Oz scope dealer has a konus mak
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~aecclaudio/konus.htm Claudio is good to deal with & could recommend a decent fixed power eyepiece {keep in imnd you don't need the GOTO mount which is used for locating stars}. I have just looked claudio has a 65mm argus maksutov in the MISc section ts only 14x mag, you could ask him if he has other eyepieces to fit {some scopes do not take normal 1.25" eyepieces)
ONe eyepiece type i use which doesn't cost the earth is the orthoscopic type - it has less field of view, but is very sharp on objects - you can scan around the diff cattle. a plossl is also reasonably priced, bit more field of view than ortho but slightly less sharp
PLEASe keep in mind whatever you get you will need to mount it on a decent photo tripod , once you have a scope get a tripod that can handle atleast ~1.5kg above the weight of the scope you get..one with a video style fluid head (long handle) is easiest to use