Anyone used a "deer-cam" or trail viewing cam?

[SmokyMtnMan]

I was wondering if anyone has used or owns a wildlife viewing camera? Sometimes called Deer-cams or Trail cameras?
I've been looking for one that I can mount on a tree in a discrete location and go about once a week and see what 'critters' i have on parts of the property I can't see otherwise from the house. Also would be used for surveillance and tresspassers.
I ordered one called Hunting Cam from Dick's Sporting Goods which was a piece of junk, software wouldn't work, camera was flimsy and cheap made. I sent it back.
I've visited a few websites and done searches and seen the ones in Cabela's, but they're either all 35mm or just too high priced.
I was wondering why most all are 35mm and not digital?? Seems it would be more practical to go get the cam and download to computer and see 'instantly' what you have rather than waiting for a 35m to develop.
Any ideas here?

[Ranchman]

Here's a link on TBN I posted a while back if you are in to "home brewing" your camera.

Wildlife Cam thread

I do get a fair # of false pics but it does work, here are a few pics of the cams I made. Attached is one of the pics they've taken that I later scanned in...

Game cam pics

I would like to convert to the digital realm too, but so far there is only one pre-made version I'm aware of and it is prohibitively expensive. If you find a cheap one, let me know.

[SmokyMtnMan]

Yes, I've visited the Jesse's hunting site. Actually, that's what got me interested. then I found the Atlantic camera site which makes mostly underwater cameras but they also had a hunting cam. I ordered it and for some reason it came from Dick's sporting goods. It wasn't worth the postage.
I found one called "Trail-Mac" on this site:
http://www.tracker-outdoors.com/index.htm

the 35mm seems ok and price real good, but the digital version is over $700 !

One in Cabelas catalog is Highlander Cameras, sounds good and nice features but it's almost $600...another one called Game-Vu is digital but only black and white.
Just wonder why so many are 35mm and not digital.

I like the home-brew jobs...but heck, everytime I try to do something like that, i end up spending more money than what it would have cost just buying one! not good at stuff like that.

[wingnut]

$700 for a digital is not surprising .... take a look at the costs of high res digital cameras.
In order to get the resolution ... and provide the extra electronics to make it work autonomously ... you're looking at multiples of the cost of analog units ...

[8NTX]

We regularly use a wildlife cam we bought at Outdoor World. Forgot the name brand but it cost $250 and has a pretty cheap 35mm Samsung camera in it. It works great, and have pics of deer, rabbits, dogs, cats, racoons, etc. We really wanted to get a pic of a cougar after we spotted some tracks a little over a year ago, but nothing yet, and no cat tracks of that size for a while.

[GSS]

Ever see those annoying X10 camera pop up ads on the internet? I did a little research on them and they really don't seem half-bad. Wireless, relatively inexpensive and usually have pretty good package deals. The one had 3 cameras, 1 receiver, VCR recording pack, etc. I've been considering them for security. Opinions?

- Gerald

[mikell]

We ust the x-10 to monitor the horses during foaling and the work fine can even monitor from work. get the B&W one for night time and a infared spotlight and monitor live from anywhere in your house.

mikell

[wingnut]

mikell .... what kind of range are you getting? I've been wanting to put them in the barn ... but all of them claim about a 200' range and I need almost double that (clean line of sight)

pete

[mikell]

20 feet or so. Check dalewheat.com rather cheap kits.

[theboman]

I have began the process of gathering the goodies to build a homebrew cam like on Jesse's wonderful site. I have most the parts on order and picked up a cam via Ebay.
Now to find a machine that makes me time to assemble the cam and ....