11-20-2007, 09:51 PM
Brett sent it along. Here it is
Salt Lake Tribune, The (UT)
Date: September 20, 2006
Section: Outdoors
Features
Scouting from afar: Wildlife voyeurs use cams to track game
Brett Prettyman
The Salt Lake Tribune
Scouting is frequently the difference between a successful hunt and a hike while carrying a rifle. But most hunters can rarely spend the time they would like watching wildlife activity around their secret spot. Many hunters probably have wondered what trophy bull elk or monster mule deer sauntered down the trail when they were not around.
Enter the trail cam. Strapping a digital camera with a motion-sensor trigger to a tree, hunters become wildlife voyeurs, watching what many of them refer to as "hunting porn."
The images are stored on memory cards. Some trail cams allow viewing at the site, but most hunters replace the cards and take them home to watch. Others download images to a laptop at the site. Manufacturers are promising future models with links to satellites, allowing the images to be sent to an e-mail account or Web page.
"I saw pictures on some Web sites of people who used [trail cameras]. My brother-in-law had a permit to hunt elk and I thought it would be a good way to see what was in the area," said Cory Hendrickson. "It definitely helped us. We saw elk we didn't know were there. The camera really helped us narrow down an area and a time to look for elk. We knew if we sat there long enough we would see one."
Patrick Hogle bought a trail camera just before the archery deer season this year and enjoyed capturing images of a nice buck leading up to the hunt. He also found that using the camera was a lot of fun.
"Scouting can get kind of tedious sometimes," said Hogle, who ended up bagging the buck. "This was a fun way to see what was going on when I wasn't there."
Hendrickson and Hogle said they and a friend downloaded shots of everything from raccoons to a black bear to people.
"I had a guy find my camera. Probably because the flash went off while he was walking by," Hogle said. "I have pictures of him looking at the camera. It's kind of funny."
Trail cameras first showed up on the East Coast and in the Midwest, where most hunting is on private property. The technology is slowly creeping into the West, where more hunting is on public property. That creates a dilemma for hunters, who spend anywhere from $50 to $800 for the cameras and fear they may be discovered and taken, and for land management agencies, which aren't sure how to handle the contraptions.
Forest Service officials are still forming a policy in Utah, but say that if rangers find unsupervised trail cameras on forest lands, the equipment will be taken down and stored at the nearest ranger station.
"If a hunter can set up a camera without tacking it to a tree or digging a hole, or otherwise disturbing the natural resource, it is OK, as long as they are camping nearby," said Lorraine Januzelli, a spokeswoman for the Wasatch-Cache National Forest Service. "As soon as they move from the campsite, they need to take it with them. We don't want a lot of cameras just hanging around. We want to maintain as much of a natural setting as possible."
The same rules apply for anything else, like tree stands, that a hunter might place in the forest and leave behind.
There is also a debate among hunting groups about trail cameras. Some wonder if using today's technology to help participate in the ancient sport of hunting is ethical. Some feel the cameras give hunters an unfair advantage and call owners of the technology lazy.
Hendrickson counters this way: "To me, trail cameras don't make shooting the buck or bull any easier. You still have to worry about all of the variables. To this day, the trail camera has not harvested an animal for me and, I believe, has not given me an unfair advantage over any game. If anything at all it's more frustrating to know that the animals are there and have been there and I can't even find them to get a shot."
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BRETT PRETTYMAN can be contacted at brettp@sltrib.com or 801-257-8902.
Caption:
Photo: A trail camera owned by Patrick Hogle caught a glimpse of this mule deer buck in August.
[signature]
Salt Lake Tribune, The (UT)
Date: September 20, 2006
Section: Outdoors
Features
Scouting from afar: Wildlife voyeurs use cams to track game
Brett Prettyman
The Salt Lake Tribune
Scouting is frequently the difference between a successful hunt and a hike while carrying a rifle. But most hunters can rarely spend the time they would like watching wildlife activity around their secret spot. Many hunters probably have wondered what trophy bull elk or monster mule deer sauntered down the trail when they were not around.
Enter the trail cam. Strapping a digital camera with a motion-sensor trigger to a tree, hunters become wildlife voyeurs, watching what many of them refer to as "hunting porn."
The images are stored on memory cards. Some trail cams allow viewing at the site, but most hunters replace the cards and take them home to watch. Others download images to a laptop at the site. Manufacturers are promising future models with links to satellites, allowing the images to be sent to an e-mail account or Web page.
"I saw pictures on some Web sites of people who used [trail cameras]. My brother-in-law had a permit to hunt elk and I thought it would be a good way to see what was in the area," said Cory Hendrickson. "It definitely helped us. We saw elk we didn't know were there. The camera really helped us narrow down an area and a time to look for elk. We knew if we sat there long enough we would see one."
Patrick Hogle bought a trail camera just before the archery deer season this year and enjoyed capturing images of a nice buck leading up to the hunt. He also found that using the camera was a lot of fun.
"Scouting can get kind of tedious sometimes," said Hogle, who ended up bagging the buck. "This was a fun way to see what was going on when I wasn't there."
Hendrickson and Hogle said they and a friend downloaded shots of everything from raccoons to a black bear to people.
"I had a guy find my camera. Probably because the flash went off while he was walking by," Hogle said. "I have pictures of him looking at the camera. It's kind of funny."
Trail cameras first showed up on the East Coast and in the Midwest, where most hunting is on private property. The technology is slowly creeping into the West, where more hunting is on public property. That creates a dilemma for hunters, who spend anywhere from $50 to $800 for the cameras and fear they may be discovered and taken, and for land management agencies, which aren't sure how to handle the contraptions.
Forest Service officials are still forming a policy in Utah, but say that if rangers find unsupervised trail cameras on forest lands, the equipment will be taken down and stored at the nearest ranger station.
"If a hunter can set up a camera without tacking it to a tree or digging a hole, or otherwise disturbing the natural resource, it is OK, as long as they are camping nearby," said Lorraine Januzelli, a spokeswoman for the Wasatch-Cache National Forest Service. "As soon as they move from the campsite, they need to take it with them. We don't want a lot of cameras just hanging around. We want to maintain as much of a natural setting as possible."
The same rules apply for anything else, like tree stands, that a hunter might place in the forest and leave behind.
There is also a debate among hunting groups about trail cameras. Some wonder if using today's technology to help participate in the ancient sport of hunting is ethical. Some feel the cameras give hunters an unfair advantage and call owners of the technology lazy.
Hendrickson counters this way: "To me, trail cameras don't make shooting the buck or bull any easier. You still have to worry about all of the variables. To this day, the trail camera has not harvested an animal for me and, I believe, has not given me an unfair advantage over any game. If anything at all it's more frustrating to know that the animals are there and have been there and I can't even find them to get a shot."
---
BRETT PRETTYMAN can be contacted at brettp@sltrib.com or 801-257-8902.
Caption:
Photo: A trail camera owned by Patrick Hogle caught a glimpse of this mule deer buck in August.
[signature]