Biggest advantage of cell cams over sd and wifi cams….

[redblood]

And there are a bunch. But i am amazed at how i am taught a daily lesson, with real time reminders, on peak times of deer movement. At work my phone starts have clusters of seizures as deer trip cams on different farms and different areas at virtually the same time. I know , that in theory, you could ascertain the same info when you pull cards and tabulate the data on paper, but man it is so much effective and immediate when you phone is screaming it you every single days. Few things i noticed.

1. Deer are active at night but not super active
2. 1st light is the most active time
3. The first 2 hours are especially active
4. Last light is really good near agriculture
5. Movement is greatly enhanced during a cool fronts and during light rains, pretty much anywhere and anytime
6. Very little midday movement until rut draws near.

 

[TheLBLman]

As the rut hits, you can still throw out much of the above.
Each of those above 6 items can be very site specific, generally true, but may be just the opposite at certain cam sites.

There is generally an additional seasonal difference in deer behavior, range shifting, i.e. summer vs. fall vs. winter, as well as changing food sources, etc.

Biggest advantage of cell cams to me, generally speaking, is simply not having to visit the cam locations so often. This saves time & money, while keeping the areas less disturbed.

Much of the extra cost of cellular service plans is actually recouped in gas & time savings over regular trail cams. In some cases, the monetary savings of cell cams makes using them less costly than regular trail cams.

Other advantages include seeing what's happening sooner instead of later.

One big advantage is knowing whether your cam is actually working, or not.
Can't tell you now many times I've had cams not working for weeks, and only discovered that weeks later.

With cell cams, if your cam quits working, you know to prioritize visiting that specific cam sooner.

 

[tree_ghost]

There is a huge advantage to having those peak movement times fresh on your brain

 

[Wrangler95]

I like the cell cams over SD card way more!Like said saves gas and disturbance!

 

[DaveTN]

How much are you guys paying for unlimited plans?

 

[Carlos]

@redblood That's a very accurate summary IMO.
I've noticed the same thing in my area.

 

[Planking]

They are really nice for trapping yotes.

 

[Ski]

I've got nothing against cell cams. But I just don't personally see any benefit. Other than the cool factor of getting instant pics on my phone, there's no information I glean from it that is any more useful than the information I get from a traditional camera. I suppose it's probably in the way they're used, what you're looking to get from it. For me, current season info isn't near as important or useful as historical info. The intel I get from my cams this year won't affect my hunt hardly at all for this season but will become critical data points to factor into historical patterns & trends going forward. For that I don't need instant pics sent to my phone.

I also often hear that checking cams puts pressure on an area, but that hasn't been my experience at all, or at least not in any significant way. The added information I get from boots on ground while checking cams far outweighs any minor adverse affects my presence might cause. I've been using trad cams for a long time and can't think of a single time checking my cams realistically prevented or hindered me from getting a buck I was after. On the other hand walking through the woods to scout while checking cams has resulted in finding sign that directly led to tagging some bucks.

At the end of the day you'll choose what you think is best and find or create justifications to support that decision, whichever way you choose to go. Given my own personal circumstances that are unique to me, cell cams are useless as tits on a boar hog. For another hunter traditional cams may be just as useless.

 

[deerhunter10]

I also often hear that checking cams puts pressure on an area, but that hasn't been my experience at all, or at least not in any significant way.

For us it's not really the pressure so much as we are spread out. Our best farm is 40 minutes away. Got a place behind the house that's a 20 minute side by side ride to get to. Just makes places like that easier to stay on top of what is going on. I've said since they came out. We killed big deer without them killed big deer with them. They take them away we will still kill big deer. But they are a nice tool.

 

[TheLBLman]

How much are you guys paying for unlimited plans?

Zero for me, because I don't currently need any "unlimited" plans.
For the most part, "unlimited" is a marketing idea causing some to spend more than necessary.

At the moment, I'm personally using multiple "plans" from 3 different cell cam brands.
None in current use are "unlimited", but would be more in the "intermediate" use area.

I "assist" in servicing some other people's cams (in the field), and some of them are wasting money on their unlimited plans.

Just for me personally, I'm getting my overall best value from my Ridgetec cams.
It's more a case of just paying for what you use, as within minimal monitoring,
there really is no "limit" on how many pics you can upload monthly.

For example, my current Ridgetec Plan is for their 10,000 monthly pic "rate tier".
The 10,000 monthly pics are spread over all your Ridgetec cell cams.
If you're running 4 Ridgetec cell cams, the total cost is $32.95 monthly.
That would average out to 2,500 pics per cell cam (or 83 pics daily per cam).

At this rate tier, works out to $8.24 monthly per cell cam.

 

[TheLBLman]

If I add another cell cam to this 4-cam "pool", the additional cam is another $6.00.
Meaning, 5 cams would cost $7.79 per cell cam.

You get alerts if you get close to using up your plan before the month ends.
You can also keep something in "reserve", just in case you overlook an alert.
I currently have @ 7,000 pics "in reserve" meaning my plan is actually for 17,000 pics.

Normally, I don't even come close to averaging this many pics per cam, so really don't need "unlimited".
Might have 1 cam that takes 3,000 pics, another takes 500, another takes 1,500, and one takes 2,000 which would mean had only used 7,000 of a 10,000 tiered "plan".

For much of the year, I can run those 4 Ridgetecs with a 5,000-pic tier (saving money).
During November, I may go up to a 20,000-pic tier for just 1 month.

These are used for a combination of security & wildlife inventory purposes.

 

[TheLBLman]

Most of my cell cams are Brownings, and their rate structure is a little more complicated if you're running a dozen or more Brownings, but their cost per cam or pic is still comparable to Ridgetec's above. Just harder to figure out how to buy only what you need, instead of "unlimited".

Similar can be said for Tactacams. I usually go with their "Intermediate" plan.

Generally speaking, Tactacam has been the cheapest for running a single cell cam;
yet can be the most expensive for running 4 or more same-branded cell cams.

Each brand tends to have some different ways they charge, varying values depending on how many cams being used, making it difficult to compare bottom line costs from one brand to another.

Tactacam's "Intermediate" plan costs $8 monthly (1st cam) for 500 pics.
If you add a 2nd cam, it cost an additional $7.50 monthly, but you do get an additional 500 pics,
meaning, two Tactcams with a "pool" of 1,000 pics between them, costs $15.50 monthly,
or $7.75 per cam.

Compare those 1,000 monthly pics to my Ridgetec's 10,000 (at $8.24 per cam),
and you see I'm getting ten times more monthly pics for only a few more cents per cam.
The cost per pic is a fraction the cost.

Ridgetec will also send ALL the pics without charging extra,
while Tactacam will only send the 1st pic of any triggered volley (unless you pay extra).

I usually set my cams to take a minimum of 2 pics per triggering event, and I want both pics uploaded. Getting them all is included in Ridgetec's pricing, but an extra monthly charge with Tactacam.
So again, trying to make an apples-to-apples cost comparison gets very complicated fast.

 

[Gravey]

Running cameras is cheating. Go hunt and be surprised when he shows up!

Ok just kidding but for me part of the fun is the unknown. We have cameras and it is exciting to know what's there but I do like the element of surprise. The biggest advantage to me on a cell camera would be staying out of the area to check the cameras.

 

[redblood]

Running cameras is cheating. Go hunt and be surprised when he shows up!

Ok just kidding but for me part of the fun is the unknown. We have cameras and it is exciting to know what's there but I do like the element of surprise. The biggest advantage to me on a cell camera would be staying out of the area to check the cameras.

I agree with you somewhat. Many spots i wont go near, because i havent a shooter in the area. In the old days inwould have just went and enjoyed the moment

 

[megalomaniac]

Redwood (and others)... I'd say your assessment is spot on.

The one weird caveat...not sure if you guys notice this as well...

But for some reason mature bucks like to get their pic taken at 2am.

Nothing else moving a couple hours before or after... but I have several mature bucks that get caught on cam then.

 

[redblood]

Redwood (and others)... I'd say your assessment is spot on.

The one weird caveat...not sure if you guys notice this as well...

But for some reason mature bucks like to get their pic taken at 2am.

Nothing else moving a couple hours before or after... but I have several mature bucks that get caught on cam then.

No doubt. Rut is a wild card

 

[chris1976]

I've got nothing against cell cams. But I just don't personally see any benefit. Other than the cool factor of getting instant pics on my phone, there's no information I glean from it that is any more useful than the information I get from a traditional camera. I suppose it's probably in the way they're used, what you're looking to get from it. For me, current season info isn't near as important or useful as historical info. The intel I get from my cams this year won't affect my hunt hardly at all for this season but will become critical data points to factor into historical patterns & trends going forward. For that I don't need instant pics sent to my phone.

I also often hear that checking cams puts pressure on an area, but that hasn't been my experience at all, or at least not in any significant way. The added information I get from boots on ground while checking cams far outweighs any minor adverse affects my presence might cause. I've been using trad cams for a long time and can't think of a single time checking my cams realistically prevented or hindered me from getting a buck I was after. On the other hand walking through the woods to scout while checking cams has resulted in finding sign that directly led to tagging some bucks.

At the end of the day you'll choose what you think is best and find or create justifications to support that decision, whichever way you choose to go. Given my own personal circumstances that are unique to me, cell cams are useless as tits on a boar hog. For another hunter traditional cams may be just as useless.

I used to think the same thing. Getting deer behavior and patterns in real time on a daily basis is really on another level. I have learned more from running cell cams year round for the last 4 years than I have running regular cams for the last 20.

 

[redblood]

I've got nothing against cell cams. But I just don't personally see any benefit. Other than the cool factor of getting instant pics on my phone, there's no information I glean from it that is any more useful than the information I get from a traditional camera. I suppose it's probably in the way they're used, what you're looking to get from it. For me, current season info isn't near as important or useful as historical info. The intel I get from my cams this year won't affect my hunt hardly at all for this season but will become critical data points to factor into historical patterns & trends going forward. For that I don't need instant pics sent to my phone.

I also often hear that checking cams puts pressure on an area, but that hasn't been my experience at all, or at least not in any significant way. The added information I get from boots on ground while checking cams far outweighs any minor adverse affects my presence might cause. I've been using trad cams for a long time and can't think of a single time checking my cams realistically prevented or hindered me from getting a buck I was after. On the other hand walking through the woods to scout while checking cams has resulted in finding sign that directly led to tagging some bucks.

At the end of the day you'll choose what you think is best and find or create justifications to support that decision, whichever way you choose to go. Given my own personal circumstances that are unique to me, cell cams are useless as tits on a boar hog. For another hunter traditional cams may be just as useless.

No doubt. If you are analytical and have the time it is possible to get all the same data from sd cams. But life gets in the way. With sd cads, id find myself blindly clicking through a literal thousand pics trying to see something that catches my eye. I may go through 100 photos before i slow down. Because of this i oaid precious little time to the time stamps and weather data on the Pics.

With the cell cams, you are force fed the data daily. Its a much more effective teacher for my learning style for sure.

 

[deerhunter10]

How much are you guys paying for unlimited plans?

12ish dollars per camera. I don't remember the exact number. My tactacams are a little cheaper then my Moultries. Adds up when you run a lot. that's why I run them only from the end of September to the 2nd or 3rd week of January.

 

[redblood]

12ish dollars per camera. I don't remember the exact number. My tactacams are a little cheaper then my Moultries. Adds up when you run a lot. that's why I run them only from the end of September to the 2nd or 3rd week of January.

Same. I run mine from late july to the end of january, then cancel the plans