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If you could....

nannyslayer

New Member
Buy a new trail cam right now, what would it be. I am going to buy a couple this week, and was wondering what was great, and what the flaws were with all of them. Keep in mind, I am NOT a big fan of IR pics at all.

Here's what I have and what I'm dealing with.

I have 2 stealth cams, that seem to be good cams so far, but as they get some age on them, battery life isn't so good.

Have a few cuddeback IR's, and one flash cam. The flash cam is fried, and the IR cams are not working for some reason. I have always liked cuddeback camera's, but with their customer service lately (just to me, others may be getting good service) I am not leaning that way yet.

2 Moultrie I-60's. decent cams, slow trigger speed, and to many blurry pics. Battery life is awesome in them though.

So what is out there, I'm open to all options.
 
I just bought the DLC Covert a month ago. I am pretty happy with the pics. Very clear. I have a few Moultries and so far the Covert is head and shoulders above them. It is a very small camera which is nice. It takes AA batteries so not to expensive. I had 1500 pics and still plenty of life in them. It also takes video.
 
Bushnell Trophy cam.. Love the pictures, love the size, love the video.. Quick trigger speed, clear photos, and the display screen is actually part of the camera compared to the coverts that come with a seperate plug in display (which just makes it easier to check battery life, number of photos, and change the settings on it, in case you happened to forget or lose the carry along). It also guaranteed a year life span on 8 AA batteries, not sure that it will last long on a corn pile though. $200
 
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Certainly aren't perfect, but the Leaf Rivers I have are very tough in terms of good box/housing. Battery life is insanely long, going thousands of pics and months at a time even during cold weather. The biggest thing for me has been service. I just sent a 5 year old cam back because the flash finally burnt out after probably 75K pics or more and they fixed it for free!! All I had to do was ship it to them. The new cams have very quick trigger as well so might want to give them a look.
 
To be honest I would buy a homebrew camera or build one yourself. There not very hard to make and you can get a much better camera IMO for about the same price you're going to pay for a commercial camera. Here are some pictures off a homebrew.
Sony W200 Cameras
homebrew1.jpg


Homebrew.jpg

Sony P41 Camera
Dadspics12.jpg

Sony P32 Camera
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Here is a website where you can figure out everything you need to know about building them..or you can just as easily buy a camera a member might be looking to get rid of. http://homebrews.forumwww.com/
 
I am partial to the Scout Guard. We used to build our own for 5 years and they were ok, but then found the Scout Guards and now became dealers for them. Small, amazing battery life, great pictures and video and easy to use. All for around $200. We couldn't build our own for that price.

Tracker, your pics are great!!
 
The P32 camera that I took the picture of the buck with cost me about $200. I like also like using the homebrew cameras because if for some reason I don't have the camera out in the woods I can take the camera out and use it as a point and shoot camera. Mine doesn't come out of woods very often often, but it that feature would be really nice with some of the higher end builds like the W200. I think the scoutguard takes some good pictures, but really don't think they can compete with some of the homebrews out there. One more added bonus is there really isn't much to the homebrews if something goes wrong with them...you can easily fix it yourself rather then ship it back to the mfg and hope they can fix it inexpensively and in a timely fashion.
 
Hey Brian...I did some research and ended up going with the Bushnell. Small camera - same as the Coverts and Scoutguards, BUT...in house programming (no remote (I don't think) - year battery life on 8 AA's - dominator had some great video and pics - 2 year warranty versus one - very fast trigger speed - clear pics. Simple in my mind...just my opinion.
 
B- the Covert II's are the bomb! If you could go with Bushnells and not have remote that would be good- 2 out of my 5 remotes are SHOT already. Other than that, they are amazing, crazy battery life, dependability, pic quality, EASY, etc, etc. Hands down the best. $250 MAX (probably cheaper) and I haven't seen a better one. MAYBE the reconyx might be a BIT better, MAYBE but I could almost buy 3 coverts. NO BRAINER COVERT II. (or remoteless bushnell)
 
Scout Guard/Covert.... not sure if they are one and the same or not.... but I like what i hear about them!
 
Had 4 Cuddebacks and 3 P41 Homebrews. I purchased 2 Reconyx RC 60's last year and they are unbelievable. The price on them is a little steep, but I am betting they will go down in the future.

Can't stand home brew cameras after using the Reconyx.
 
The Coverts,Scoutguards, and the new Bushnells are suppose to be out of the same China maker. Check out chasingame.com for reviews. I have homebrews but thinking about one of the new ones. Lots of options. That Reconyx is suppose to have 1/5 of a sec. trigger speed. Wow! Nice pics Tracker.
 
Scout Guard/Covert.... not sure if they are one and the same or not.... but I like what i hear about them!

Scoutguard/Covert II/Bushnell Trophy Cam = same cam

The only difference is their housing, whether they have a remote to them, a very slight difference in trigger speed (they are all very fast), warranty, and battery life.

Otherwise, they have the same 'guts' to them.
 
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