IP: 50.169.207.239
Posted on June 12, 2014 at 03:27:48 PM by katchaya
I am constantly encouraging posters who have sightings to install game cams, but I have had no actual experience with one myself. I live in an urban area, and it's doubtful that there are Mountain Lions prowling my neighborhood although there are plenty of much scarier 2 legged apex predators around (I live in a kind of not nice neighborhood at the moment).
The way my building is set up, there is a ton of glass and some of the hallways have a southern exposure. I am fortunate to have one of those. There is a brick flower box on the floor opposite the hallway windows where we can grow things. There is also a crazy lady in our apartment building that likes to destroy and steal other peoples plants. She has attacked mine twice now and I am really pissed. I was looking at expensive wireless cams but they all needed a power source that wasn't going to work in my situation. Then it occurred to me, why not a trail cam? it's going to do what I want (take pics with a motion detector) and I'll catch the perpetrator in the act so something can be done about this. In the meantime spring/summer has come and most of my stuff has been moved outside. We also started a community garden here. Again I am afraid of trespassers doing damage.
So I ordered a Moultrie D55-IR Game Spy 5 Megapixel Digital Infrared Game Camera (Camo) w/ 8GB Memory Card - It was a refurbished item and the total from Amazon was a few cents less than $69.
I have to tell you the pictures are fantastic. The motion detector is good for 35 feet and the infra red pics are ok too. I can only say it was a great investment. Takes 6 C batteries. Allegedly they last 4 months according to reviews I read but because this is a highly trafficked area I expect them to last less but I'll let you know. Also I had to make some retro fitting for the safety of the camera. I got some wire vinyl covered cable and made a loop through one of the plastic parts of the case that normally you might hang on a nail on a tree. I used those stainless steel couplers to secure the loop and then ran it through a bike lock cable (the ends where the lock was wouldn't fit through the hole that was there for the nail or screw) and locked it to our compost container. Below is a link to some of the pics.
The most "wild" thing we caught on this one was a robin. The original is there and then a cropped version for detail.
So my best advice really does turn out to be the best. If you know of a likely spot, get one of these and start monitoring it. I do love technology.
Oh, and at the end of the summer, I will be bringing this baby in to mount on the wall facing the flower box. We'll see what pictures we capture then.
game cam pics
Replies:
- Re(1): Game Cams - By weather01089 June 17, 2014 at 08:56:15 PM
- Mountain lion sighting. - By al leighton June 23, 2014 at 10:58:16 AM
- Re(2): Game Cams - By Katchaya June 17, 2014 at 10:10:46 PM
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