Night moves

For the past couple of years we've forgone exchanging Christmas presents, and bought something for the two of us. This year it was a game camera! It finally arrived, and we waited with bated breath for the first night's pictures.

Except there weren't any. It was pointed too high. So for the second night we lowered the angle, and by morning we had two pictures that were not a) Jasmine, or b) us.


3:56 AM: Coyote in a hurry.


5:03 AM: Star-struck spike buck.

We put out a mineral lick and some corn, to try to make the critters stop and pose. But we may need to move the camera to an area that's not quite so open, if the animals continue to stay so far from the flash area.


Close-up of the coyote.


Close-up of the deer.

Why is he looking directly into the camera, I wonder? I can't hear the camera trigger, but maybe he can.

I've wanted a camera like this since we first moved here. They say that there are no bears or mountain lions here anymore... we'll see!

The camera we got is the Cuddeback 3.0. The only downside is that the picture is taken about a second after the trigger. Still, that's a lot better than many of the competing models with 5 or 10 second triggers. And to get one faster (1/10 second) would have meant spending $1000, so...

I can't wait to see what all goes on at night when we're asleep!

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Go to the Cuddeback photo gallery for some really great wildlife pics from Cuddeback owners. Mostly deer, but also elk, bears, bobcats, and even a wolverine! Judging from the number of new pictures added daily, a lot of people received Cuddebacks for Christmas.