Wes Parrish said:
BSK said:
For those who experience no white or red-flash camera avoidance: do you have any black-flash cameras?
I'm not one of those who has experienced "no" white or red-flash cam avoidance, but am among those who has experienced greater cam avoidance with red-flash, less with white-flash.
My take is there are other factors leading to "avoidance" of a "spot" (where you place a cam) than just what type flash is being used. It
may be that a "flash" can have a cumulative effect on these other factors, i.e. a little human scent alone didn't spook (just alerted), but
combined with a flash,
or a sound from the cam, the deer is spooked.
I completely agree Wes. Simply placing an inert box on a tree in a given location is going to cause some avoidance, probably from the combination of the box itself (something "new" in the environment which deer tend to shy away from), scent on the camera box, and scent left in the area when placing the camera.
However, I do tend to think the "new thing"/scent avoidance decreases with time, as long as nothing harmful or frightening occurs in conjunction with those factors. And I say that because of how often I see the number of picture events
increase over time at black-flash cameras, unlike visible flash camera set-ups that produce dramatic decreases in picture events over time. Eventually the deer get used to the black-flash camera box and the human scent associated with setting the camera up, and begin using the area as frequently as they did before the camera was placed there.
I have been experimenting with the invisible black-flash. Have noticed that some deer "appear" to be running away from it, too, on a 2nd or 3rd triggering BUT don't think it's from the flash. I think sometimes deer just turn and go. It may APPEAR they've been spooked (when they haven't). Sometimes an older deer will walk up in front of a cam, get its pic taken, then about that time it gets a whiff of some scent it doesn't like, turns and quickly leaves ---- nothing to do with cam flash, but may "appear" to have been spooked by the cam, when it was actually a "spooking" (leading to future avoidance of that "spot") caused by scent, something else, or a culmination of several things.
Again, I agree Wes. I've definitely seen deer show real hesitation about approaching ANY TYPE of camera in daylight. They see the camera and avoid it. I too have many pictures of deer staring at a black-flash cam both daylight and night. They will stand and stare for sometimes long periods of time. I also think some decide they don't like that thing hanging on the tree and leave.
But I'm not quite as worried about what appears to be short-term reaction to the camera as I am ultimately about the data collected. Am I getting the same mature bucks back to the same location (i.e. repeat photo events of the same mature buck at the same camera site)? With
non-baited locations, rarely do I get repeat visits to white-flash cameras. Yet I regularly get repeat visits to non-baited black-flash camera sites.
In addition, how many pictures can I get of a particular deer PER VISIT? With white-flash--no matter how many burst-mode pics I have the camera set to--generally only 1 or 2 pictures before the deer gets out of the way of the camera flash. With black-flash, many, many more pictures in a single burst-mode series. And when monitoring baited sites, I can get many factors more pictures with black-flash. A particular mature buck may revisit a baited site monitored by white flash, but not as often and they don't stay as long. Generally, I get 1 or 2 pictures and then the buck doesn't come backto that site for days. When monitoring a baited site with black-flash, a buck may come back every day and stand at the bait for 45 minutes providing upwards of a 100 pictures of him.
