One frame from the video of the Black Bear on the Range Ops trail camera.
Canting the trail camera to match the incline of the trail it is recording gets the animal better framed in the images and video.
The Browning Trail Camera Tree Mount makes it easy to point the camera the way you need it.
I placed this new camera out today on a trail leading up into the pines.
This Red Squirrel munched on pine nuts next to me while checking the trail cameras. They can rip through a pine cone in blazing speed.
The Browning AA trail camera batteries look really cool. I'm giving them a try for the first time. (Dec. 2013: These are good batteries and you can view favorite batteries for my trail cameras.)
I got the black bear on video! I have twice had a black bear get captured at night with IR black and white images in weeks past. Two weeks ago I even ran into a bear at 30 yards when I was on my way in checking my cameras. It was a cool and exciting experience. Especially cool because bears are unheard of in this area.
After using the trail cameras for about a month I was sold on the video that the browning trail cameras capture. With every encounter you get you capture so much more with the video than you do with the images. I had hopes that I had captured the bear on one of the cameras two weeks ago but didn't. After setting all my cameras to capture video I had yet to get the bear on the cameras until now.
After reviewing the footage of the black bear it would appear that he smells something he doesn't like. As the bear comes into frame he starts to get more and more nervous, then he eventually turns around (during the 5-second delay between captures) then bolts away running directly away from the camera. He smelled something he didn't like. I just don't see how it could have been the camera. Who knows???
As I spend more and more time working with the trail cameras I have found that I like to rotate the camera to be on the same plain as the trail that the camera is watching. Often my cameras are set up watching a trail that is on an incline. If I set the camera level watching an inclined trail, animals are not in full frame as they cross through the viewing area. On one side I get chopped off legs and on the other side, chopped off antlers. Rotating the camera to be on the same angle as the trail gives me video and images with the animal fully framed all the way across the viewing area.
When the trail cameras are canted on the tree they sure look like they are mounted incorrectly but they capture great footage with the animals fully framed in the viewing area. Unless I mentioned that the image is canted you would never know that the video or image has been canted to match the incline.
With the Browning trail camera tree mounts, I have found a couple of different ways that I can mount them on the tree. 1. You can do the typical two straps around the tree. 2. There are two holes in the mounting plate where two quarter-inch lag bolts can be used to secure it to the tree. I recommend using the sharp grabbing screw of a tree stand footpeg to bore a pilot hole to use to get the lag bolts to screw into the tree. The lag bolts do not have the sharpest point and are a little difficult to get to start into the tree unless you have a pilot hole to get them started. 3. I have also found using the mounts great for use on small diameter trees by placing the mount sideways across the tree. See: Wow a Black Bear! Checking Trail Cameras — Using a Browning Trail Camera Mount
I picked up a couple more Recon Force Browning trail cams this week and set them out while checking the other cameras. One new camera I placed on a trail on the edge of heavy dark pines. I would figure that the elk would use this area to transition into the cool bedding areas of the pines. It didn't see any elk sign in the area where I set the camera at. Plenty of deer tracks and some cattle. We'll see in two weeks what is using the trail.
I set the second new Recon force trail camera back in the original location I had a camera along a well-used trail in the heavy maple trees. The new location I moved the camera too two weeks ago produced beautiful video of elk and mule deer in the early morning light although I didn't get a lot of elk and deer passing by it. In fact for that matter, I got the least number of critters on camera since I started putting them out this summer. I'm not sure what might be changing their habits. Heat, human traffic on the adjacent property, bears???
In two weeks I'll be back out checking the cameras and I will be carrying my bow. :) Hopefully, a good bull is hanging around.
I found this partial piece of a mule deer skull. This was a pretty good buck that died without its antlers. Lion kill, wounded by a hunter? The highly zigzagging sutures in the skull show this was an older buck.
Here's the Browning Trail Camera Tree Mount securely mounted using 1/4 x 2" lag bolts.
Here's a spike elk walking past one of my a Recon Force trail cameras.
This location makes for making beautiful photos in the early morning light.
Here's a cow and calf elk walking past the trail cam.
The best mule deer buck that we have had on the trail cameras. Looks like a big 3x4 with eye guards.
This bull elk isn't to shabby. He has really small g5 points budding. If they are long enough or grow more he'll be a 6x6. This might be the same bull I got on video the last time I checked the camera.
