Effectively Using Trail Cameras

It is that time of the year for white tail hunters. Turkey season has passed, the weather is becoming more cooperative to be outdoors, fawns have been born, crops are planted, and bucks are coming into velvet. For many, this means it's time to get the old trail cameras out and start working this year's hunting plan and goals into shape. This past memorial day weekend, I did just that. Trail cameras themselves are a topic of debate. Should they be allowed, should traditionally be permitted while cellular are not during hunting season. Those debates are never ending and have their place. This post focuses on trail camera usage, tips, and tricks. In Ohio, where I live and hunt, trail camera usage is completely legal, therefore this article is not one focusing on the debate.

Trail cameras are great tools that can effectively help determine local deer population, density, age class diversity, and more. At the same time we all haaaate scrolling through hundreds of pictures of plants blowing in the wind for the handful of deer pictures. Choosing the right cameras and setting them up is vital to ensuring you are catching the deer and not the wind. When it comes to choosing the right trail camera, it can certainly be painstaking as much of it can be trial and error. No one wants to spend money for a piece of equipment that just doesn't work. For the most part, but taken with some caution, the more you spend on a camera, generally the better it will perform. This is across just about every metric; reliability, functionality, ease of use. Etc. But this is not a set in stone rule. I personally have had great luck with Moultrie cameras, with some of my oldest and most reliable being from their cheapest line. At the same time, I have a line of cameras in the $200+ dollar range, of those 4 I have 2 left. Of those 2 only 1 has ever worked completely with no issues and I did not have to send it back to the manufacturer. Do research, test the cameras out, play with their functions to understand ranges, capture angles, but at the end of the day there will always be some trial and error to find out what works best for your budget, set up, and style.

No matter the trail camera you ultimately choose, it is important to set the trail camera up for success. The location, position, tilt, what the trail camera is pointed at, how long you may be away, and much more play a role in the success of utilizing the trail camera. Like choosing a trail camera, much of this will be trial and error. Due to all the different brands, styles, and personal setting preferences, there is a good amount of playing around that you will likely have to do. But, there are some actions you can take across the board to ensure that your trail cameras have the best chance of functioning how you would like them to. Starting with some simple things like cleaning your camera. Your camera likely has dust and debris on it and possibly in it. Ensuring the battery housing is clean and the batteries are in good working condition. Ensuring the camera and sensor lenses are clean and there's nothing that may get in the way of sensing or capturing photos/videos. Have the camera clean, set, and ready with a functioning SD card BEFORE you leave the house so you are not trying to get all that set up out in the woods.

What is in front of your camera when it is sitting waiting for deer to come plays a major role in functionality and success too. There’s the obvious like low hanging branches and standing agriculture. What may be less obvious would be underbrush and time of the year. You may stomp down and clear out some underbrush a good 5-10 feet ways from your camera in early fall and never have an issue. That same spot in May or June may require you to revisit to clear out growth every 3 weeks or so. Then you begin to get into your pressure tactics. Should you be fully including your scent control routine for trail camera maintenance through the summer because you need to go in to clear undergrowth? Pointing a camera directly perpendicular 3 feet on the edge of an agg field in the summer may not be an issue then. Then as the corn grows the deer start shifing their paths, maybe even by just a few rows of corn may now be problematic. They're either so close up on the camera you're getting pics of their butts. Or, because of 3 rows of 6 ft tall standing between them and the camera the camera can't catch its movement and trigger. Think about not only the conditions of where your camera is for the day you hang it, but the weeks and even months following.

I like to place cameras on existing deer sign, I do not try to pull deer in with attractants and baits. I will use supplements or baits to get the deer top stop in front of my camera to help ensure I get good pictures. But, as stated, finding the deer sign comes first. I like to place my cameras about belly button high and pointing straight out, or very slightly down if angled at all. If I am using a bait or supplement to stop the deer, it is at least 10 feet away from the camera. Experience has provided me way too many photos of deer bodies with their heads down eating the supplement with a follow up picture of their butts as they walk off camera. I ensure my field edge cameras are pointing S/SSE/SSW or N/NNE/NNW. Cameras placed on a field edge that point E/SE or W/SW, especially without a decent forrest and canopy in the background will provide exceptional pictures of over exposed/white-outed sunrise and sunset pictures. Finally, I bring my bag of trail camera hanging tools and I go out in the woods with the goal of hanging well placed and effective cameras. I may take an electric weed eater, hand sickle, hand saw, and extra straps/cable locks. Like many other aspects of hunting, this has come from experience. I've wasted too many trips hanging too many crappy cameras (regarding location, not the camera itself) because I went in the woods with a few cameras and a pocket knife and didn't have the right tools.

At the end of the day, trail cameras are just one piece of your deer hunting arsenal, part of your plan to meet those whitetail goals. I heard on a deer hunting podcast a long time ago, from Mark Kenyon if I remember correctly, that deer hunting is a game of small percentages. There is no one thing that's going to give you a 50% chance in getting that dream buck. It's 1-2% with scent control, 4-5% stand placement, etc. and trail cameras are just another one of those tools to give you a 1 or 2% greater chance of getting on that deer. Use them effectively and gather as much info from them as you can. Seeing no deer on a properly functioning and hung camera still provides information, you at least know there's no deer right there at that time of the year. I had an instance where I knew there were deer in the area but would never get pictures of bucks on one specific camera. I moved the camera 10 yards back and turned it so it was pointing in the direction of my stand and figured out the bucks were just walking behind it all this time. If you really want to take advantage of utilizing trail cameras be prepared. Have a plan in place, make a checklist if you have to, be meticulous and purposeful, and set them up so you can be successful.