Trail Camera in the garden?

[jbclem]

Is anyone using a Trail Cam in their garden, or orchard, to keep track of the animals that are picking the fruit or eating the vegetables/plants. I'd like to know which are the reliable brands and what characteristics to look for.

[zeuspaul]

I don't have a Trail Cam but I do have security cameras that frequently catch wildlife. There are several ways to set triggers. I use the VCA (Video Content Analysis) line crossing and box incursion triggers but there are many others. Several different triggers can be set on each camera. It is rare that I don't get at least one video capture every day/night, mostly rats, birds and coyotes but also an occasional skunk or racoon.

[Kurt]

We use one for our mango season.Should be infrared for the night time critters.Then you set appropriate traps etc.Also two are located at driveway entrance to record any nite two legged creepers that have been checking cars.You can get notifications via your connects and some new ring products.Battery life is a regulator for our regimen,some get up to 200 exposures.The mid nite rippers usually park away so we have license plate images.The porch package guys come towards the evenings following the delivery done at that time.Was never this bad.

[karstopography]

We have an Arlo system for the house. I does pick up armadillos, raccoons, foxes, and other creatures that creep around at night or the delivery drivers and such that work during the day. The batteries in each camera last about a month before needing recharging. I have the video come to my ipad and can get near instant notifications any time day or night to see what’s lurking about around the house. So if someone is coming to the front door, there might be a 10 second delay on getting notified or so unless I have the camera on live feed then it is instantaneous. The camera picks up the person coming towards the door out pretty far so even if there is the brief delay they probably haven’t even gotten to the door before I get the notification.

I have seen squirrels heading to the garden on the video feed and have gotten off my duff to take active measures to prevent squirrel depredations.

[DriftlessRoots]

We have a Stealth Cam and it works pretty well. We don't leave it out for extended periods, mostly just checking on what's around the yard. We did deploy it once in the garden to see who was munching on our pepper plants as soon as we set them out. Turned out to be a rabbit so now we fence that bed right away.

[GoDawgs]

We have a Stealth Cam and it works pretty well. We don't leave it out for extended periods, mostly just checking on what's around the yard. We did deploy it once in the garden to see who was munching on our pepper plants as soon as we set them out. Turned out to be a rabbit so now we fence that bed right away.

I have an inexpensive game cam and like you, use it now and then out of curiosity to see what's out there in the garden, especially if there's munching going on.

In 2015 I experimented with that thing about 20 lb fishing line strung at several levels around beds to protect legumes from deer. After it got all torn up one night, I fixed the lines and set up the camera. Yep, the line was no deterrence for this guy! I took the lines down the next day.

[DriftlessRoots]

Sorry to jbclem for getting off topic but I just had to share my favorite trail cam capture.

[Paulf]

I bought a $100 Trail Cam from Amazon about ten years ago mostly to see what was knocking down the bird feeders (mostly raccoons) and to see what was eating the plants in the garden like green beans and the freshly sprouted plants (mostly deer). The brand name was Papake which is now unavailable but there are several that look the same for about the same price. The one we have takes very good photos at night much like the above photos. It will take stills and video. The daytime photos are as good as the cameras we have. It is battery powered. I have gotten lots of wildlife photos that wonder through the yard, day and night. Not many animals get into the garden and no deer since putting up an eight foot fence around it. Raccoons still love to eat birdseed and suet cakes, but they get live trapped and removed. Having a trail cam has been lots of fun just to see what goes on when we are not around or sleeping.

[Kurt]

Did find the coons are inquisitive maybe to the click? the send to my device?the electronic send don’t know.The “send”Perks up my Min Pin Roxy Lady,then our Rhodesian Ridgeback ears are up,here comes Rommel ,German Generals all named Runstadt,Runsky(AKA)the Rottweilers.They look up waiting for the the signal.Now they go back to sleep.

[bower]

I bought TP-Link Tapo for the house, based on reviews at CNET and Wired, very affordable and good for the purpose, sends notifications to my phone. But their outdoor, battery operated line is a lot more expensive. Their wired outdoor camera is low priced, but you need a power source of course. If you have outdoor wired lights already then it should be easy to add cameras. They have siren and lights on them, so in theory could be used to scare off critters as well. And they have two way talk feature, so if you want to yell at a racoon you can even do that through the camera. I can confirm that these cameras have a wide field of view which is certainly a good feature to give you better coverage per unit.
The recent CNET review of outdoor security cams puts Tapo wired outdoor cams in the bargain spot, if you have outdoor wiring. Arlo brand comes out as top rated at a higher price. Worth the read:
https://www.cnet.com/home/security/best ... y-cameras/
Obviously these are not actually trail cams - which are really a different breed. Just reading about the huge variety of functionalities here:
https://www.popularmechanics.com/advent ... l-cameras/
Seems like the less expensive option is one where you pick the SD out of the machine to see your images, and would work well for just the purpose of identifying what is eating your garden, but no real time monitoring.
One really good point in the article is that animals will notice a camera that stands out from the 'habitat'. This is so true, because the critters including birds and moose will heads up and stare when I raise my silvery camera in the window of the house. They are really attuned to spot anything "shooting" at em.

[Kurt]

Most nite time marauders use the sense of smell to locate food so when we handle the devices we wipe clean of our human scent.We “had”a raccoon come and stare into he cam.I noticed the reflective eyes of most critters in he images,we believe the infrared system seems to alert them,they seem to recognize the cams.All our mutts show the trait,except our Rottweiler.They are known not to show thier yes.

[Paulf]

None of the critters seemed to be inquisitive about the camera or moved after it began clicking or whatever noise it makes. They were intent on eating. Maybe human noises don't bother these guys.

[bower]

I noticed that the dedicated trail cams had 'low glow' IR to avoid alerting animals in the dark.