Trailcams

I had a great weekend with a visitor to my neck of the woods. My old buddy JP.

Amongst other things, we chatted about up and coming projects and checked the camera traps in the local woods.

I’ve been using a Scout Guard 550 Trail cam. They are quite hard to get in this country. But the benefit over other trail cams are their small size and the batteries last for a good while. After getting used to positioning the camera (the infra red lamp is very bright and can reflect off vegetation at short distances) I started to get some good results. I’ve used it almost exclusively on video as opposed to stills shots.

The trick is obviously to set it up on popular trails and runs, but I’ve also put it in areas where I’m not sure whether there’s activity or not, which, of course has saved a lot of time and effort waiting for something NOT to happen. So, in this case, a negative result is nearly as good as getting a picture of something.

It’s always a good idea to camouflage the camera. If you look at the video shots below, you’ll be surprised how the animals are aware of something unusual in the environment. Also, even though I have a security cable, it’s an idea to keep it concealed from human view.

I’m going to Devon to instruct for Shadowhawk next weekend, so I will be back next week.

Here’s a compilation of trailcam footage I’ve collected over the last few weeks.