Cellular trail cams

[Jim Fred]

Looking at buying 3 or so cellular cameras to help guide me in hunting some public lands next season. Any suggestions on what has worked for you all, or better yet what to stay away from?

 

[Spurhunter]

There's several recent threads containing enough reading to keep you busy for a while. Happy reading!

 

[redblood]

Dont know them all.

Tactacams and spartans are hard to beat.

I have 2 muddy manifest 2 that cam with batteries and an sd card i bought for 60. 00 from midway. They do pretty well

 

[JArender]

stay away from moultrie, and spypoint for sure. I love m'y spartan golives but they wouldn't be a great option for public land because they chew through batteries and really need external at very least and solar. I love my wiseeye mini's but not in love with hunt control app. Ridgetec is a great camera and i'm testing a blackgate r4g starting this week. i'm hoping it functions as well as their CS does. if so it will replace all my spypoint as they die. their lifespan seems to be around 2 years haha

 

[puppy]

stay away from moultrie, and spypoint for sure. I love m'y spartan golives but they wouldn't be a great option for public land because they chew through batteries and really need external at very least and solar. I love my wiseeye mini's but not in love with hunt control app. Ridgetec is a great camera and i'm testing a blackgate r4g starting this week. i'm hoping it functions as well as their CS does. if so it will replace all my spypoint as they die. their lifespan seems to be around 2 years haha

I posted today asking about the Ridgetec experience but I went to the Blackgate site and looked at the specs I could find. Do you know anyone who already runs one of them and could share a pic and do you know if you can share the downloads from the camera with others?

 

[JArender]

I posted today asking about the Ridgetec experience but I went to the Blackgate site and looked at the specs I could find. Do you know anyone who already runs one of them and could share a pic and do you know if you can share the downloads from the camera with others?

I don't yet. other that herd360. i'm hoping to get mine in the field this week but will likely be end of next week

 

[UCStandSitter]

Tactacam aren't perfect but for the money… Sure get a lot of bang for the buck

 

[1smoothredneck]

Tactacam gets my vote. Good app, great battery life, really nice pics, and reliable ime. Good luck

 

[backyardtndeer]

Got one of these stealthcam from Sam's https://www.tndeer.com/threads/call-cams-at-sams-club.424198/.

Came with batteries and a 32 gb card. About eighty days in and still on original batteries, and also still on the first 3 months of free service. Have mine set to the higher resolution setting and it takes pretty decent pics. I would buy another at the price I paid for mine.

 

[puppy]

I don't yet. other that herd360. i'm hoping to get mine in the field this week but will likely be end of next week

I have been emailing with owner/CEO and he has been very helpful but to get a response from him tells me the company must really be small, although that is not necessarily be a bad thing as customer support should be great. I small business can not afford any bad press and usually goes above and beyond to make things "right". I have asked him for some sample videos or a link to a site that can see some at since not on their website, pics on website look good for a cell cam. I will update on if he provides any videos.

 

[philsanchez76]

I posted today asking about the Ridgetec experience but I went to the Blackgate site and looked at the specs I could find. Do you know anyone who already runs one of them and could share a pic and do you know if you can share the downloads from the camera with others?

@TheLBLman I believe is the local Ridgetec expert user. He may be able to help ya out. I really wanna try one of these too. My wife will kill me at this point if I buy another cell cam. hahaha

 

[themanpcl]

Dont know them all.

Tactacams and spartans are hard to beat.

I have 2 muddy manifest 2 that cam with batteries and an sd card i bought for 60. 00 from midway. They do pretty well

Just my experience with Muddy cams. I had a Manifest 2 and 3 different times cam stop working after downloading required updates and had to be replaced. You have to be at the cam to take the updates. After the 3rd cam replacement, I went back to the Stealth Fusion. Not sure where you hunt or how you place the cams but for me, I'm 1.5 hrs from my TN lease and 3.5 hrs from IL public we hunt. I place them in areas that I do not want to put a regular cam and tromp in there regularly to check cards. That said, every required update meant a trip to the cam to take the update disturbing the area where the cam is for days possibly permenantly. The time to drive there and back plus the money for gas made the total cost for taking updates expensive. The total cost for the trips including time and money spent would have bought 4 new cams in the end. That said, the Stealth is better but not by much. (2 replacements, same update procedure) Both Stealth and Muddy are owned by GSM Marketing. I am not pleased with their customer service nor quality of products. I am now looking for a new cam that requires no manual involvement in updates (cell download only).

 

[JArender]

I have been emailing with owner/CEO and he has been very helpful but to get a response from him tells me the company must really be small, although that is not necessarily be a bad thing as customer support should be great. I small business can not afford any bad press and usually goes above and beyond to make things "right". I have asked him for some sample videos or a link to a site that can see some at since not on their website, pics on website look good for a cell cam. I will update on if he provides any videos.

that's what I like and want to support. they have one or two employees counting owner and will add more as customer base grows im sure. wiseeye has a handful. ridgetec has 4. not sure about spartan but i'm doubtful it's more than 10-12. I talk to the same three cs people every time I call or get a call back. small american business selling cheap chinese crap. haha. I buy almost all my cameras and supplies through herd360 for same reason. when I call I get to talk to mike!

 

[puppy]

that's what I like and want to support. they have one or two employees counting owner and will add more as customer base grows im sure. wiseeye has a handful. ridgetec has 4. not sure about spartan but i'm doubtful it's more than 10-12. I talk to the same three cs people every time I call or get a call back. small american business selling cheap chinese crap. haha. I buy almost all my cameras and supplies through herd360 for same reason. when I call I get to talk to mike!

Who is herd360 and how contact?

 

[JArender]

Who is herd360 and how contact?

Mike Kirkpatrick. his website is herd360.com facebook page too. he only sells cameras he can stand behind.

 

[redblood]

Just my experience with Muddy cams. I had a Manifest 2 and 3 different times cam stop working after downloading required updates and had to be replaced. You have to be at the cam to take the updates. After the 3rd cam replacement, I went back to the Stealth Fusion. Not sure where you hunt or how you place the cams but for me, I'm 1.5 hrs from my TN lease and 3.5 hrs from IL public we hunt. I place them in areas that I do not want to put a regular cam and tromp in there regularly to check cards. That said, every required update meant a trip to the cam to take the update disturbing the area where the cam is for days possibly permenantly. The time to drive there and back plus the money for gas made the total cost for taking updates expensive. The total cost for the trips including time and money spent would have bought 4 new cams in the end. That said, the Stealth is better but not by much. (2 replacements, same update procedure) Both Stealth and Muddy are owned by GSM Marketing. I am not pleased with their customer service nor quality of products. I am now looking for a new cam that requires no manual involvement in updates (cell download only).

I can understand that. Both of manifest are on the farms i own, within walking distance. I havent had to update. Tbe only issue i had is it took one cam overnight to activate

 

[redblood]

But tactacams are safe bets

 

[TRHC]

I've had very good experience with Spartans that I've bought from herd360. There are lots of options out there, but whichever ones you decide on, go ahead and pony up for the lithium Energizer batteries. These are by far the best stand alone trail cam batteries. I have no experience with adding solar panels.

I'm also well pleased with the replacement wire antennas instead of the paddle type that came with the cams. Helps A LOT with concealment.

 

[TheLBLman]

One more thing many many not realize:

MOST cell cams actually operate just like a regular any other trail cam,
if the cell "feature" is not in use.

This means you can use your cell cam as a regular trail cam,
then only utilize the cell feature whichever times or months you want most.

In other words, if you ran a particular cell cam year round, you might use it as a regular trail cam 8 months of the year, as a cell cam say only 4 months, etc. Be aware, if you've been using it as a regular trail cam, then activate the cell service, it will immediately upload all the pics on the card not previously uploaded. So usually best to change the sd card before re-activating cell service.

 

[themanpcl]

One more thing many many not realize:

MOST cell cams actually operate just like a regular any other trail cam,
if the cell "feature" is not in use.

This means you can use your cell cam as a regular trail cam,
then only utilize the cell feature whichever times or months you want most.

In other words, if you ran a particular cell cam year round, you might use it as a regular trail cam 8 months of the year, as a cell cam say only 4 months, etc. Be aware, if you've been using it as a regular trail cam, then activate the cell service, it will immediately upload all the pics on the card not previously uploaded. So usually best to change the sd card before re-activating cell service.

Most plans allow for you to suspend service as well.

 

[Shooter77]

I bought spypoint cams 3 years ago to try because it was one of the cheaper ones to try. I've had various issues at times, but for the most part, they get fixed by battery replacement, firmware updates or just changing the SD card to a formatted one. I now have 14 spypoints, 4 flex and rest micro LTE. I've had 4 cams replaced under warranty. I leave all my cams out 24/7/365. So they get exposed to all conditions. CS does suck now, it seems like in the past 1.5 yrs the company has grown, but the CS dept has shrunk. I like them for what I've paid and the photo xfer programs they have.

Biggest reason I've not dumped my spypoints, is the photo xfer fees. With spypoint, you get 100 pics per cam a month free. I joined the insiders club, 99 a year and I get 250 a cam free. This amount works pretty well till about Nov when deer seem to be more active. Others I've looked into, have a cam line fee of 4-10 per month per camera. Then there is a fee for # of photos plan you get. Then add the additional cost of cams, with others ranging from 125-599 compared to spypoints for 100.00.

I have really struggled with switching to another brand, but it cost so much to make the change at this point.

 

[Jim Fred]

I ended up buying 2 Spypoint Flex cameras, have had them out since Friday and both seem to be working OK. Not sure how the battery life is gonna be though, but I did only put AA alkaline in them. The cell service feature is pretty cool to have too, my sudden outburst scared the wife to death when the image of this big fella came through yesterday evening.

 

[Shooter77]

I ended up buying 2 Spypoint Flex cameras, have had them out since Friday and both seem to be working OK. Not sure how the battery life is gonna be though, but I did only put AA alkaline in them. The cell service feature is pretty cool to have too, my sudden outburst scared the wife to death when the image of this big fella came through yesterday evening.

View attachment 160180

Great buck! I run lithium on my cell cams. One defect with flex, it will show battery low at times when it's not. I've had cams out since July and just replaced 1 set and just had the 2nd go dead last week.

 

[wobblegobble]

 

[deerhunter10]

For the money tactacams are hard to beat and they work well. I also have bushnells and they have been good as well but the plans are more. I threw my spypoints so far I don't know if I'll ever find them again complete waste of money. I don't remember exactly the total but it's around 12 dollars a month for tactacams for unlimited and 5 dollar per 50 videos. Bushnell is about 15 a month for unlimited. Never ran videos on them. I only run mine end of September to January so I don't do a yearly thing on my tactacams. Bushnell don't offer yearly. I read in January tactacams are doing so new things on plans but not positive. I have 5 tactacams 2 bushnells. Will be adding more tactacams. If money is no issue reconyx is probably the best cameras on the market. I love my browning regular cameras so will be looking more into their cell cameras over the off-season. Have a few buddies running converts and they like them. Don't have any experience with them personally.

 

[Falconi]

View attachment 160331

That's frame-worthy.

 

[BigAl]

I bought a Tactacam from Walmart. Haven't taken it out of the box. My problem is the cell service in my hunting area stinks. Waiting on an add-on antenna to install and test.

 

[sgtwebb1]

I bought a Tactacam from Walmart. Haven't taken it out of the box. My problem is the cell service in my hunting area stinks. Waiting on an add-on antenna to install and test.

We have the same issue on our Bridgeport property--cell service SUCKS with Verizon, but AT&T works perfectly.
No service at all with VZ--4 bars with AT&T in the deep hollers.
Changed all our cams to Tactacam with the AT&T card, getting photos constantly.

 

[Realtree]

Looking at buying 3 or so cellular cameras to help guide me in hunting some public lands next season. Any suggestions on what has worked for you all, or better yet what to stay away from?

I recently bought a Tactacam reveal x. Seems to work real good so far

 

[TheLBLman]

I recently bought a Tactacam reveal x. Seems to work real good so far

They do work.
Do you have any other brands/models you've used for comparison?