Things that go bump...

[Inuvik]

Game cameras have become really affordable, and the night photos they take can be pretty good. Here are a few from either my work, or people I work with locally:

Lots of pigs

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/MDGC0006.jpg

One of my favorites - be sure to notice the goats on the left side

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/DSC_0244.jpg

Conventional wisdom says that mountain lions don't run in packs. A dead steer was very attractive to these cats

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/kitties3.jpg

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/kitties2.jpg

This picture is pretty poor due to fog, but the story is that there is a trap full of hogs down in the brush, and one of my employees about 100 yards uphill at the time this was taken

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/MDGC0446.jpg

Anyone else have good game camera pictures to share?

[la-li-lu-le-lo]

Nice pics. I never seen a pack of mountain lions like that.

[SMETNA]

Nice pics. I never seen a pack of mountain lions like that.

Same here. Wow

[Inuvik]

Yep, I think a lot of folks were shocked to see a whole pack (pride?) of Mountain Lions like that. They are supposed to be really territorial. I am wondering if they were yearlings or something that were still kind of hanging around their mothers, and had not established their own ranges yet.

[Inuvik]

I found a couple of more good ones I had. This cat is walking right past a client's front deck. When looking through the photos, the homeowner walked the same path less than 45 minutes before the lion!

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/PRMS0569.jpg

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/PRMS0568.jpg

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj562/Inuvik1/PRMS0570.jpg

[Denali]

I use trail cams every day, and I have formed some opinions on them based upon real field performance. First off, I'm not looking at deer over a pile of corn, we have camera traps running all throughout the blue hills, and Chequemagon national forest, the targeted species are wolves, and bear.

The Bushnell trophy cams "2012 model" have been extremely disappointing, in fact, we have just pulled them all from the field entirely, because they are virtually useless for capturing night time imaging. Some of the daylight stuff can be quite nice, however we have discovered that any motion results in significant distortion, and streaking, even in broad daylight!

The night time imaging is so consistently inferior, even cheap Moultrie cameras costing half their price, easily outperform them, if the images aren't streaked, they are so utterly lacking in contrast that the animals virtually merge with the landscape...There are good cameras available, however you must be prepared to dig deep for them, Reconyx leads the pack in performance, but you'll need $500.00 for one...IMO there are only just a small handfull of units worth the cost, and none under $200.00 for anything other than snapping images of static subjects, such as deer at a feeder. For deployment on a game trail, where predators are to found, you need a camera trap that can snap images in bursts, trigger in under a second, reset virtually instantly, and deliver solid, contrasty images, both day and night...

These four captures illustrate the problems with Bushnell's trophy cams very nicely...

[Inuvik]

Thanks for the input! I will have to check out the Reconyx. The last three pictures I posted were taken with a Primos Truthcam 35, which I think we paid about $60 bucks for. I agree that the Moultries are a pretty decent bargin. The one we had worked really well, but finally died when it went swimming in a beaver pond overnight.

[iasc300]

Those cougar pictures are amazing. I have never seen anything like that before

[M4Fundi]

This is in the parking lot at White Ranch trail head near Golden Colorado that a mountain bike team I was affiliated with trains on.... this was taken just as they were heading out to ride... they were less than thrilled as you can imagine:eek:

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/lions.jpg

This guy tried to get my pigeons one night. He had to crawl thru the door bobs to get in and then was trapped with the pigeons mocking him:p
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2789.jpg
Really beautiful owl at the most northern tip of its geographic range
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2791_2_2.jpg
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2802_2.jpg

[lethal dose]

Beautiful pics, my friend.

[Dr.Venkman]

Very cool pics of the owl. Such a cool looking bird!

[M4Fundi]

A few more of his misadventure with the pigeon coup:p

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2780.jpg

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2784_2.jpg

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2799.jpg

I've seen so many birds of prey with eye injuries that I really wanted to get him out of there fast... you can see he already took a lick between the eyes
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2797_2.jpg

He had some serious claws and I have had lots of rescue birds go for my face:eek:, so I was going to get him out, but carefully:D
Success
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2804_2.jpg

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/IMG_2804.jpg

[M4Fundi]

I can't remember if I posted this before. This is my friends pointer LuLu and she got nailed running out the front door one day by our Noble Mascot here... I don't believe in shooting Bald Eagles, but that one is high on my shitlist:eek:

The Guilty
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/EagleperchedinYardbyRiver.jpg

Bird Dog's worst nightmare
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/LuLusEagleWounds2.jpg

Drain tubes
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/LULU-afterstitchingdrainsetc003.jpg

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/LULU-afterstitchingdrainsetc006.jpg

Fully recovered:D
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/45Fundi/Luluhood.jpg

[Dr.Venkman]

I use trail cams every day, and I have formed some opinions on them based upon real field performance. First off, I'm not looking at deer over a pile of corn, we have camera traps running all throughout the blue hills, and Chequemagon national forest, the targeted species are wolves, and bear.

The Bushnell trophy cams "2012 model" have been extremely disappointing, in fact, we have just pulled them all from the field entirely, because they are virtually useless for capturing night time imaging. Some of the daylight stuff can be quite nice, however we have discovered that any motion results in significant distortion, and streaking, even in broad daylight!

The night time imaging is so consistently inferior, even cheap Moultrie cameras costing half their price, easily outperform them, if the images aren't streaked, they are so utterly lacking in contrast that the animals virtually merge with the landscape...There are good cameras available, however you must be prepared to dig deep for them, Reconyx leads the pack in performance, but you'll need $500.00 for one...IMO there are only just a small handfull of units worth the cost, and none under $200.00 for anything other than snapping images of static subjects, such as deer at a feeder. For deployment on a game trail, where predators are to found, you need a camera trap that can snap images in bursts, trigger in under a second, reset virtually instantly, and deliver solid, contrasty images, both day and night...

These four captures illustrate the problems with Bushnell's trophy cams very nicely...

It looks like ghosts are in the pics.

[Dr.Venkman]

Glad she's all healed up. She's a very good looking dog!

[M4Fundi]

Glad she's all healed up. She's a very good looking dog!

She is a doll... not as big a runner as her long legged big sis who is a lemon colored gal, but LuLu is solid..... just don't let her get near your truck or she will climb all over it:p

[WillC]

Badass!

I wish I could have dropped some trail cam's along my route during some of the Land Nav portions of my training in the mountains in Cali and in Alaska ... there are noises I heard during the night Nav's that still scare me when I think about them. Not to mention some of the eye reflections when I would decide to go white light, I think that is one of the reasons we were still allowed to have them (but would be in deep shit if we were seen using them) as opposed to some of the other courses. We were also issued large cans of bear spray while in Alaska.

Things that go bump in the night indeed.