I purchased 2 sets of 4 Cuddelink cams off ebay when they had a lower price special of 4 for 569.00. I was a little disappointed when received and the camera housing has no cable locking attachment molded into the housing. So I had to get Cuddeback metal housing. And I'm glad I bought the Cuddesafe metal housings. They mount with 2 drywall screws to the tree and I use a cable lock system to secure it to the tree. I never had a problem of thefts on my farm but at a total cost of almost $200 per camera I wanted to be secure. I installed 5 cameras around the farm with the home camera in my back yard for easy memory chip removal to check the other 4 cameras. #1 home camera in my back yard. #2 camera is down the hill about 150 yds from #1 with a service level of 68. #3 camera is across my food plot about 200 yds from #2 and service level of 94. #4 camera is up hill in my woods about 200 yds from #3 and service is 34. But quality of pictures is great back to home camera. #5 camera is about 200 yds from the #1 home camera on the other side of the farm with service of 78. I got 158 pictures on #2-3-4 cameras but none on #5 which is on a little used trail. This was on the 1st day and 2 nights. But about 20 pictures were of me setting the cameras up. Picture quality was excellent for day and night pictures and detection distant length seems OK. The Cuddelink report that's available off the home memory chip is a good review of all 5 cameras results of battery level, number pictures taken, and the service level between cameras. So far after only 1 day I'm impressed with the system. But time will tell after several months of use. I'll do updates as time requires.
My only recommendation so far would be replace those drywall screws with some hardened lags. Drywall screws don't take much to break. If you're gonna invest in a security box you may as well make sure the things is secured to the tree!
The screws just hold the box straight and tight against the tree. I have cabled locks threw the box and around the tree for security.
If you go to www.Habitat-Talk.com there is a thread that covers this topic thoroughly. As of now there are 111 pages
I have 2 cams and the cellular one. I get about 2 weeks battery life on a bait pile/minerals, or a couple of months in a random spot. I’ve had mine a yeah and love them. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
How many photos are you getting over bait in that two weeks? Is your cell cam taking photos or video? One shot immediately after another or does the camera hold a few minutes between shots? How often is the camera sending the photos to you? Sorry for all the questions, but if I can’t get at least 60 days out of a cell camera I’m not sure it would be most beneficial for this specific area. Any other suggestions? The bucks don’t come back for almost two-three weeks after we check our cameras in this area and it’s the acorn drop we need to hunt it, we have seemed to miss the acorn drop two seasons in a row.
On bait, I have the cam set at 30 seconds. I get around 30 pictures every 4 hours. I have it set to send pictures every 4 hours. I think if you had the cam send once a day it would last a lot longer. My cell unit doesn’t take pics. It’s the “home base”. I keep it on a gate in my back yard. I had a Covert cell cam that sent pictures pretty much as it took them. It lasted a lot longer on battery’s. There’s supposed to be a D battery conversion kit to replace the AAs. It’s supposed to last way longer. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
