Game cam

[surewood]

I'm looking to buy a few game cams for next year. Probably been asked several times before, but I want to pick up some inexspensive ones. I'm not concerned with the picture quality as much as decent trigger speed and battery. I've searched the internet for reviews and figured I'd get my best info her.

[IRISHSOBNO4]

i bought a primos truth 35. put it up 1 week before the rifel season and the batterys are still at 50% it takes great pictures and i am very happy with it.

[Farley]

I bought the Moultrie MFH-DGS-D50 Game SPY Camera and love it for an inexpensive one it works great. Color daytime photos and B&W nighttime. Also does video but havnt used that yet. Heres the only pic I have on my computer here to show:

[birdswacker]

Search the other hunting forums there's alot of good feedback guys have talked about with various game cams.

[Realtor Boy]

Cant beat the price of a Moultrie.. My batteries last up to 6 months as well depending on wheather...

[skee0025]

I have a bushnell trophy cam. good pic quality, great battery life but the trigger speed leave something to be desired. I have a bunch of pics where I'm catching half a deer. This is after they worked a scrape and the licking branch directly in front (15 ft) of the camera

[surewood]

Thanks everyone. Farley that's a sweet pic.

[hockeybc69]

Best thing to do is go to a site called chasin game.com

Take the space out between the n and the g. Its a blocked HSOforum on here.....

Cabelas has the Primos Truth 46 for $99 coming on sale.

Walmart has the D50 for $85.

Beware of the Bushnell Trophy Cams for 2010. Very rough reviews overall. Internet searches will find many reports on that.

[Farley]

Thanks, that particular deer ended up getting hit by a car, we found it dead and rotting while pheasant hunting. Too bad, it would have been a good one next year.

[triggertrav]

dont buy a cuddeback. batteries drain in 2 weeks and night pictures blow.

just my most recent expirience.

[B. Amish]

i have a moultrie and it does have excellent battery life (it should for taking 6 d size batteries). pictures are ok. but i hate the thing because it makes a clicking noise evertyime it takes a picture. it has a little lense that flicks when a picture is taken and you can totally hear it. i've set it to video before and it scares deer constantly. if you have it set on picture, you can't tell it scares deer, but on video, you can see them run away.

i can only put it on a salt block and leave it there all year. the deer tolerate the clicking noise because they want the salt.

i also have a bushnell trophy cam (2009 model). it has great battery life, but it sucks in cold weather - anything below 30 degrees and the thing is worthless. the sensor has a wider range than the camera itself, so it can get triggered by a deer standing off to the side and the deer won't be in the field of view of the camera when it takes a picture.

IMO - nearly all comercial cameras on the market have something that is of poor quality. if i ever get another one, i think i'd buy a homebrew.

[hockeybc69]

Homebrews have their place. Best pictures out there. Depending on the camera, the flash is better than 90% of commercial cams. Trigger speed can be better than most commercial cams.

If ever buying a homebrew, be sure to get one that has the external battery mod done though.

That means, find someone that has modified the camera so that it can run on a pair of D cell or C cell batteries.

The puny AA batteries are ok for summer use, and even limited there. But in cold weather, you can be lucky to get a week out of them and 20-30 pics. In summer you get a couple/3 weeks at tops. So if you cant check them for long periods of time, you are going to be dissatisfied.

I have built 15 of them and had a lot of fun with them. But my frustrations with them and not having the external battery mod has changed my tune. I have sold all but 4 or 5 of the homebrews.

There are plenty of decent cams out there. Amish is right. Its a crapshoot on most brands of cameras. If I were buying I would be trying he Primos oness,. Seems to have as good of reviews as any. And thats no gaurantee, I know.....

[Musky Buck]

Moultree, took over 1,000 pictures and batteries were fine, only issue is now on occassion the display is not totally clear, like 80% clear or so, not sure why but hooked up to the computer the timedate etc. is stamped clear yet, is that a moisture issue or something but for a couple hundred bucks it's already paid it's way for me. Anyway mine took about 800 pictures last winter and I had over 50% somehow battery life yet, 6 D's lasted me the Sept.-April, what I don't like about mine is how poorly that 1 strap works in a way, they should have had like a top strap and a bottom or something, it's so top heavy like and had 1 side plastic hook up snap when tried to tighten it down and what's the fix for that broken plastic on the back, and being so top heavy it's hard to get the cover to stay open while using the laser aimer, cover shuts partially and laser feature then doesn't work, all in all just on not having to worry about battery life ever to me makes it worth it.

[deerminator]

I ended up getting a cuddeback IR for $200 counting the rebate. The trigger speed is great compared to anything else I've ever owned and have not had problems with the batteries. Same ones in there for about a month now and its been coooold. Only downfall is yes, the nightime pics are less than desireable. But they're clear enough by all means to see detail. Very easy to set up and operate compared to other cameras I've owned too. But I've usually bought models under $100 in the past.

[hockeybc69]

For anyone that wants to get into a homebrew that does utilize the external batteries, Here is an example of a cam that is a top shelf option. This one is sold, but I wanted to show what they look like. And if you are spending in the $200 range you will have your socks blown off by what these things can do for pics.

http://208.109.19.38/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=18381

This guy is a wizard with homebrews. I have gotten to know him via the QDMA forums and everyone that has bought a cam from him is just signing accolades. He has helped me out with a problem cam that I sent to him, and he didnt even want anything other than shipping to cover costs.

Cant say enough about Jim.

His email is [email protected]

[MN Mike]

Moultrie D-55IR, has to be the best battery life I've seen in a Game Cam so far and the pics are pretty good. We set one up July 14, it's taken hundreds of pics this summer and still has 40% left on the 6 C batteries that were installed new in July. I've seen them as low as $89 at Mills Fleet, might have to keep an eye out for more if they go on a late season blow out.

Mike

[surewood]

Mike after some looking that's what I have decided. Thanks everyone.

[Code-Man]

My reviews:

Stealth Cam Sniper IR: 140-160 dollar range. Did amazing photos had 1-9 shot burst great IR at night. Locked up one day and couldn't do a single thing with it. Cannot remember battery type but it was fair for batteries.

Wildgame IR4: 90 dollar range sales now for 50-60. Very Slow Trigger on Picture and only one shot option but it has day/night only option plus 25 hr for pictures. During turkey season i set it to day time only just to save the 500 video clips of deer/racoons I caught on camera. AMAZING Video for a 90 dollar camera. I had lots of issues with this camera and took it back 5 times till I switched out for a different model. IR is fair but very tunnel vision. Batteries are C and fair for battery life.

Moultrie D50 90 dollar range sale for 50-60. Three shot burst is nice. Sadly it is digital flash but deer got used to it where I had it ALL year. Picture is ok but video sucks with what I have found with it. Takes D batteries 6 of them and drains them FAST when cold.

Moultrie I55 119 dollars 90-110 on sale range. I tried one cause it was on sale for 90 dollars. Does 3 shot burst along with moon and temp on picture. IR is fair/good area, I've seen better I've seen worse. I tried video once and it did an ok job was a bit impressed but I didn't have many videos don't know if the trigger didn't go on a few or deer traffic went from 10 a day to 1 a day was just odd. Batteries are C's and battery life is amazing on the units.

Truth Cam 35 around that 119 area. LOUD TRIGGER! Could hear it 20 feet from the camera. Used it for a week and had 3500 pictures in 7 days. not one of a deer. Did have burst mode which was nice but seemed like a touchy trigger. Hold down the arrow keys and you could watch a video with the movement. Did lock up on me for some odd reason after one week and wasn't impressed with the noise of the shutter so switched it for another camera.

Wildgame X6C 130 dollar area: They make one with a screen in it to view pictures also I do NOT have that model. Only does one shot on picture. Takes AA batteries and battery life is DANG good for how many pictures I get with it. IR is AMAZING almost 30 yards in the dark. Great clarity in pictures. VERY Small unit 4"x6"x2.5" and I'm not sold on how durable it is since the wires are exposed for going from unit to batteries but it's working good so far. I would only recommend this unit IF they had a burst mode. Only thing holding me back from buying strictly this model is the lack of the burst mode. Trigger is awesome, had video on once and it drained batteries QUICK so haven't tried it again but it was cold and was on low batteries to begin with.

This is what I have found out. I know people that have had some of the models I have had bad luck with for years and no problems but I could get a lemon. I have purchased all of my cameras from Scheels and was given one from Outdoor Warehouse. Scheels you have a problem they switch out the unit and away you go. Outdoor Warehouse sent in my Stealth Cam and about 4 months later I got told from Stealth that they credited the store a month and half earlier and I had to argue with the manager to get my money back. Was NOT impressed with their Customer Service and the unit was the hardest to program.

[mrklean]

Menards has some pretty cheap ones that work decent and fleet had some really cheap ones for black friday

[MNmikew]

dont buy a cuddeback. batteries drain in 2 weeks and night pictures blow.

just my most recent expirience.

My night pics are OK with my cruddyback but I have a similar batt experience as triggertrav has. You'd be lucky to get one week if its cold. Had mine in to Cuddy for repairs on this, TWICE, still no good.

I picked up a cheapo wildview EZview this fall for $49 a FFarm. Seemed to work pretty good for a 1.2mp camera. The one thing that I don't like about it is that its only mode is 3 pic burst, which eats storage and batts.

[InTheNorthwoods]

Menards has some pretty cheap ones that work decent and fleet had some really cheap ones for black friday

One word of caution after going through several different brands and models:

CHEAP does not always = INEXPENSIVE

You will fast learn that the costs of driving to check your cams, the costs of replacing batteries, returning cameras that break down, frustration of cams not working, missed pictures, and etc.... will cause a "cheap" camera to quickly become an "expensive" one.

Some tips/considerations depending on your intended use:

1. Flash cams have crisp, color night photos but will burn batteries much faster than IR cams;

2. IR cams can take night video's (a neat feature I use);

3. Trigger speed can be important if not set up over some type of attractant (you'll "pay" for trigger speed) and some brands are better than others with trigger speed;

4. Cheap cams, in my experience, will either miss the subject matter or simply not detect movement of critters at times;

5. Public or private land - cams can grow "legs" and disappear at times, you'll want to weigh that risk with the cost of the investment in the cam, and also look at the potential security features such as the ability to lock w/ a cable to the tree.

In the end, I have personally settled on the Moultrie gamespy I.R. 5.0 Cabela's model. They aren't without their faults, but the battery life is good to great, have nice options/features for number of photos/delay, okay trigger speed, take great color day pics, allow night videos, and can be returned to Cabelas fairly easily if you should have problems and Moultrie has decent customer service. They can be had for less than $175 on sale.

I am sure there are other cams that are good, these are just the ones that have worked the best for me. If I had limitless funds, I'd go Reconyx. There are also some nice "homebrews" that are being made, but I don't know enough about them at this time to really judge their worth.