What does no flash cameras have to do with scent control? Does the camera suddenly become invisible because it's no flash?


What prompted the topic for conversation was the video below (39 minute mark) and another where they basically say cameras MIGHT do more harm than good during the season. This isn't "Momma said cameras are the devil." I totally get the ideas of don't check them often, check when raining, use cellular if you can swing it, check on the way to your stand, etc., but that's not always reality. I know I got to the point to where it seemed worthless to check them because the pictures were either deer at night or stinking dogs. Again, I would guess the dogs are more of a problem than the cameras, but I can control the cameras better than I can a half dozen dogs. I simply wanted to get the conversation going and see if anyone had tried backing off cameras and doing so was worthwhile. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love seeing what all is on camera and it's great to keep a 9 year old interested, but busting my butt all year for him to see 2 deer during daylight the whole season sucks in terms of keeping his interest.

Joe, I know you're hunting family land, but your area may just not hold a lot of deer. Game Cams have nothing to do with it. I know places in the state of Alabama where you can see 50+ deer on a hunt, and the thought of not seeing any deer isn't even possible.

I fought it for 15 years, but...."hunt where the deer are" is the best advice. Some of Alabama just has bad deer hunting, plain and simple.

Yeah, it's 55 acres of family land in Marion County. Can only do so much.

We hardly ever kill a deer we do not have history with on camera. Have they helped me? They have helped me be a little more selective and hold out for certain deer. I am a competitive person so it is a competition to me to pick a certain deer and hunt it. Not everyone is the same. I use them to help me determine the area in which he is using, not pin point exact travel times and locations.

I wish our hunting club would outlaw cameras al together way to much pressure on the property with every member with multiple cameras out. There not supposed to be checked only when hunting that area but that’s not what’s happening. Very seldom do the camera nuts kill a very good deer.

I run them before bow season all the way to beginning of gun season. After that they do more harm than good. Getting a pic of a good one on camera will do two things for you during hunting season. Make you booger up a good area, and hunt a deer that will rarely show back up there. I'd say pics to kills have been very very low. Typically the good ones on camera will wind up getting killed on the other end of the property.

I was in a club with 45 members, 9000 acres and we had 1 guy who put 28 cameras out..... can you imagine if each member did that? Even at 9k acres it would have been pressured to Hades and back.

28 cameras on 9k acres? Psssh. If you go out there and suit up in your scent free bubble-suit, wear your shoulder length cattle birthing gloves that have been bleach cleaned and stored in a sterile, vacuum sealed environment, and don't breath why you are setting em up the deer won't even be the wiser, 28 cameras or not. Really the best solution is just to use a full blown Scuba rebreather while working on in the woods setting up cameras. You just gotta know how to use em right is all.

I am down to doing some buck inventory with them after the season ends. I cant help myself and drive myself crazy checking them during the season. It just pressures out already pressured deer more.

I have found that it is more fun for me to be surprised and not ever knowing what could step into the cross hairs than going after a certain buck.

I've spent whole season hunting a certain buck I have on camera only to kill a nicer one that I had never seen before.

I like the luck aspect, it's more fun to me.

i probably check my cameras once every month or 2 I just like to know whats there i abandon them by gun season. they really help out knowing a deers schedule in bow season. once the woods fill up with rifles and fall gets in full swing the patterns change.

IMO, you should place your camera out before season for 2 weeks and then take it down and move it. If you aint got him on camera in 2 weeks, well he aint in that area. I know a guy that keeps his camera on his feeder all the time and checks it weekly. Like some deer from 10 miles away is suddenly gonna take up at the feeder. He said he likes to watch their racks grow, well I like to shoot them so I do it differently. To each their own. Figure out what your goals are. Killing deer or watching wildlife. We do place them on traditional scrape lines a few weeks before the rut and take them down when we hunt it on the way out.

I’ve killed several I’m confident I wouldn’t t have without the use of cameras.

They are an incredible tool and I’ve never seen any bad effects or negatives. Doesn’t seem to bother anything.

best use of a TC is to identify different bucks you have using yer place and to pre age them so you don't have to rush it and make a mistake, if that if important to you.

My game cameras provide me with some degree of exercise. Usually sometime around October I start trying to remember where I left them back in February. And I end up walking to a dozen different places, over a few miles, until I find them.... Or sometimes I don't.

100%. It helps me tell guests which bucks to consider, and which ones are definitely too young.

I don't think you read what I said..... I said imagine if all 45 members did that (45x28=1,260 or just under 1 camera per 9 acres).

Since I've had money to get good cameras and understand what makes deer come get their picture taken I've gotten to where I enjoy placing trail cameras and seeing what I get on them just as much as I do the hunting. The hunting part of it is almost bittersweet because the chase for that animal I've been watching so long ends.

I love having cameras out to get photos of what I want to kill and eat.

I dont like using them anymore. It takes the hunting and wondering out of it for me. It turns into just waiting on billy to come by around 2 so i just need to be waitin for him.

You must be hunting a different species of deer than I am because there ain’t no pattern to the bucks I have on camera. The does pattern super easy but I have yet to be able to confidently say I’ve patterned a buck.