I’m starting to hate them too. But I’m also slightly addicted to them. I have several cell cams on public land that I hunt an hour away, and on some private I hunt an hour away. Last sit I had on the public I was 20 yards from one cell cam and 60 from another, I saw 11 deer that morning and not a single one on camera. On the private land my dad was on an evening hunt, he saw 10 deer and we got one fawn on camera. It’s so hard to trust the intel, but when they aren’t going off it’s tuff on your mental game
Even further to add insult to injury i think to myself , wow, what are the odds i see that buck in front of whatever stand, so i hunt that stand for a couple days and dont see him, then the first day i hunt somewhere else he appears again. A lot of guys chalk that up to bad luck when in reality that buck has your number and making you look like a chump. Or is it just bad luck??? Its the uncertainty that makes this so fun.
IMO those situations, more often than not, are telling us that we're doing something wrong on our entry that's causing the buck not to be there when we're there. It just happens too often for it to ONLY be a case of bad luck. Either our entry is fouling him up, or maybe we're hunting it on the wrong wind, or somehow getting busted or making those mature bucks avoid the area without us even knowing it's happening. I refuse to believe it's nothing but chance and luck. Thanksgiving morning, I had two spots in mind. I decided to go to the farm I hadn't hunted in a while because I wanted to fix a couple of cell cams with dead batteries when my hunt was over. Of course, the deer I'm after on the other farm came by the stand I decided not to hunt that morning. Not just once, but twice, about an hour apart.
Be smart and strategic about where you put them and if they're card cams, when you check them. I have some spots that I can get to easily without messing stuff up in there. They're good inventory spots that usually reveal whats in the area in the 5-6 months they're running. I am thinking of grabbing a couple cell cams for spots i'd never walk into without hunting them. That is the huge benefit to those cameras to me. That and saving the gas and legs checking them if they're far away. Interestingly enough, it appears more states are cracking down on cell cams. I see Kentucky is currently working toward a full ban of them on public land. I don't know how I feel about it yet to be honest. I have read some pretty bad stories on how outfitters out west were using them to put their clients on elk. Essentially, as soon as the camera got a pic of a big bull, they'd quickly load up their clients and be in the vicinity in short order. I don't know about anyone else, but that really does seem to infringe on the idea of fair chase. I've read quite a few stories similar to this. On the flip side, as I mentioned, being able to not have to mess up a spot, but get an idea of what may be in the area is huge. But then again, maybe thats not fair chase either. A few years ago, I killed a ten pointer using cameras. It was the old card cams, but I checked it one day mid week when I had a second and discovered that this buck was in the daylight in early season on an acorn flat for two straight days. I went in and killed him the next evening. There again, is that really fair for the deer? lol
I am 100% in favor of banning trail cameras on public land. 5 years ago when I went to KY it was pretty rare to find one. This year, there were multiple cell cams on the edge of every bean field I walked. I talked to people while I was there who were running 20-30 cameras at a time to try and locate deer. You can't take a piss without worrying about someone seeing your wang on their cell cam. Which, in my case, would be detrimental to my reputation. If not an all-out ban, at least a ban on cell cameras on public land I would be in favor of.
Thats really interesting that you are seeing first hand what I have been reading about. Its hard. I can tell you that in the 15-20 years of using cameras (all card cameras), I have only killed one that I killed shortly after getting the picture. I have several that I later realized was that buck. Last years buck, the one in my profile pic, I never had on camera, even though I had two in that area. A property owner next door had a pic of him the day before I killed him and gave me that pic. But yeah, i agree. I've been on a lot of public now and cameras are everywhere it seems, even miles back in the mountains. Who knows who's seen my junk on camera. Maybe thats why my wife recieves so many sympathy cards in the mail... lol.
Funny but not funny I was reliving myself in Ohio this year and wasn’t paying attention and someone got a full action shot haha, feel bad for them. Definitely a pile of cell cams in Ohio that were never there in years prior.
Call it a tin foil hat theory but i have seen less and less mature deer since having started using cell cams. Going to only run SD, or none at all, in a couple spots to substantiate
IMO, it's a tin hat theory. I've heard a few people talk about this, and I don't think there's anything to it. If it's something you're really worried about, set your cell cams set to upload at a scheduled time once or twice a day so they are rarely connecting to the cell network and transmitting information while there are deer directly in front of them. Problem solved.
My buddy swears deer can sense cell cams, I debunked this in my own mind by moving cell cams around and replacing them with SD cams. Alot of variables and all uncontrollable. Deer pics didn't increase or decrease from cam to cam. They were primarily on green fields earlier in the year when I tried it.
Most are set high and all are set to one or twice a day send (simply to save battery life). Of the 2 dozen out I think 18-19 are Tc brand, but I do not see a distinguishable difference. They all seem to be avoided. side note- thanks for role with the site
It has been wild here in Missouri. I've seen a major increase in cell cams from last year to this season.
Ive still got one regular cam out, havnt checked it since I put it out back in Sept ... 16 gb card, set on one pic 5 sec. no vid.... wonder what on it ... if there is ever a good wind direction, I have a tree to hunt by it, but east/se is so hard to come by, esp. when all I have are days off to hunt now .. .... If its a rain out Fri. as predicted, I may just drive down and pull it ... may not even use 'em next season, one less thing to worry about .....
