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TRAIL CAM FACTS
Here are a few things you can learn from if you have
never used a trail cam; some things to remember;
Make sure the camera you buy has an INFRA RED FLASH,
do not buy a camera with a normal white flash, you
will spook animals, and also give a position away to a
person walking past it at night or in low light in the
day!
If you think you have animal traffic but due to hard
ground you can’t see fresh tracks, then a trail cam
is amazing, it will tell you exactly what is walking
around your grounds! You can maybe capture footage
of stuff you never thought you had!
Always set the camera at an angle to your area you
want to film, so it captures a greater area
DO NOT face it
facing dead straight at a cross road, as you wont have
much of an area to capture on film, so placing it at
an angle to a roadway will help, and make sure it is
in a position that the sun comes out behind the camera
and not in front. Small tips that help! Keep it knee
height or a little higher max 90 centimetres.
Don’t forget a bait spot to make the animal stop etc
giving you more time for videos and pictures. I use a
rock with pilchards and cat food on it. Fisherman’s
red bait also works well.
(Use red bait in a
cage trap; you will catch cats with that!)
A trail cam - a good one, will have various settings
to customise your pictures. The principal is like an
expensive digital camera, has a viewer for looking at
pictures in the bush, it has a setting to take
pictures in various pixel settings etc, so here is
what I like.
REMEMBER some cameras come with a memory card to
capture photos, BUT some cards are small and can’t
hold a lot of info, so read on.
This is important info to a beginner.
Generally it is BETTER to put the camera on VIDEO
settings rather than photos, BECAUSE an animal on
video will give you far more general info about that
specific animal. It will tell you his body language,
what he is doing, if he is alone, what is temper is
like, feeding in general, and things a photo would not
reveal.
Remember now that if you want to film on VIDEO put the
camera on LOW resolution if you don’t - the video when
running will fill a memory card in 2 seconds, and you
won’t capture anything till you reset the camera.
This is another point always refresh the cameras
settings as much as possible, if you don’t it can
cause the camera to not function properly. And always
erase the cameras memory after seeing pictures.
I don’t view photos in the field, I take out the
memory card and put it in my laptop or digital camera
or a card reader, (slip out the card and put in a
fresh one). I look at them on those items, I don’t
mess with the trail cam in the filed.
The laser that needs aiming to make sure the camera is
pointed in the correct area, well lets say on a
MOULTRIE Spycam 160, it is a small 10mm x 10mm MOTION
SENSOR behind the white plastic cover, it is in direct
alignment with the camera. So, if you want to take a
picture in the day, place the camera on a tree, and
walk to the spot you want to be filmed, get down to
jackals height and look at your camera, IF it is
looking at you dead on, with the camera in its square
shape looking at you directly flat in your face, then
that camera will be ok to take a picture, as long as
you position it to look straight at your position. You
don’t need to set it with the laser, you will get the
idea when you set it once or twice, you will see what
I say is correct. Take a few pictures; you will soon
see how easy it is to judge and not to use the laser
at all.
So, put it on low resolution for videos, for photos at
night use high res and make it standard practise to
set the camera to take 3 photos and not one.
SEE THESE TWO LINKS FOR TRAIL CAMS;
http://www.africanpredator.com/art_jackal-hunting-secret.html
and
http://www.africanpredator.com/art_trailcam.html
Remember that security number, DON’T FORGET IT. I use
a calibre for mine, and I have a message on the camera
at the top, if somebody finds it in the bush, it says
“
DON’T STEAL ME, DUE TO A PASSWORD IT IS OF NO USE TO
YOU”.
The cameras in general are amazing; these few small
things mentioned here should help you.
GENERAL IDEA OF A SETTING
HERE are two pics of a mouse, I was trying out a new
camera for a client and this mouse appeared, you can
see exactly what time, and it was set on for the
camera to take two photos, one was a hit the other was
when the mouse was gone already. (Moultrie 140)
The camera when set on taking more than one picture to
fire every one minute, here is example; see the times
on the photos
Mr Mouse came to say hullo at 1-28 in the morning, he
was a metre away from the camera, and the camera was
set on the ground.
Here the mouse has already gone but the camera still
takes another picture. Time is 1-29. I had the camera
set on 2 pictures.
If
you buy a trail cam, you will enjoy it for sure!
See my website for the jackal photos we took in the
Free State
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