Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Trail cameras-Fair Chase?

With all the use of trail cameras these days,seems like it is an unfair advantage for hunter. Cameras sitting on water or bait 24 hrs a day.Are we getting lazier?Trophy at any cost?

Add a cell phone to the package and one won't have to endure the trip out to check things.

I do not use them because they would be stolen on public ground.

All they do is give you a picture, not like it kills the animal for you.

They already have them with cell connections. e-mails a picture to you online.

So if you go scouting a new area or a old one a couple of times and dont see a good animal,are you gonna still hunt that area.If you have a camera on a water source for a couple months and see there is a good animal coming in,you wont hunt there now?

This question sort of proves a delimma for me. On one hand, trail cameras add a whole new chapter of enjoying the outdoors. I can see the animals I chase year round and watch things I'd never see otherwise. On the other hand, it takes away a lot of the mystery and excitement of what 'might' be out there.



Sometimes I think the best place for my trail cameras would be at the same spot as my cell phone,.....at the bottom of a lake.


Just feel that maybe I should step away from all the technology and BS and just friggin' hunt.

the automatic update ones, yes could see those being bad......normal ones you have to go and check? all they tell you is where a critter has been in the past.....wish Montana's laws werent as strict cause i would like to use them to check some stuff out, less looking for horns more to try and see what other critters are around but the way Montana law i written you can only use them briefly during the year as they cant be used during ANY big game season....which means you can use them from about June 16 to Aug 14 this year.....

I like setting out in the off season. interesting to see animals.

never used to aid in hunting. kind of have mixed feelings in that regard.

We were given thumbs for a reason...

from what ive seen during our deer season mule deer move and act differently through the season as the rut usually kicks in the last couple weeks.....usefulness could be limited, know the elk we hunt move alot aswell....

know ppl elsewhere that use them and short of sitting in a tree stand with all the trails wired with the automatic update ones i honestly think though they are helpful they arent a huge advantage....

...a hunter with Class...

I have 4... no, 3 or them. One of those $200 boogers took a $200 poop. I have pics of alot of deer That I never see during hunting hours. The only deer that has ever been caught on camera and killed was 15 yards in front of my wifes tree stand and 2 days later during youth muzzle loader season a 14 year old kid sitting in a tent 400 yards from my front door killed it. I heard the shot and walked out to see the 192 " pig. I have a blue spruce in my yard the bucks love almost to death every year. I put a camera out there this year { 39 lazered yards from my back door} and caught 5 different bucks in one night. I have more than one picture of a 190 class 10 pointer rubbing the tree. Never see them while hunting tho

Is your truck fair chase or should you walk to the hunting woods? Binoculars? Radios? Rifle scope? It can get a little ridiculous. A deer that feeds and waters at night, isn't necessarily going to show up during the daylight. I don't use trail cams, but I can't see where they increase your odds of taking a trophy animal.

Dan

My viewpoint exactly -- almost. I think they can (but haven't yet for me) increase the odds of taking a trophy animal. For one thing, they can tell you a trophy animal is there, and help you make a decision where to hunt.


Funny how two people can think the same thing and come to the opposite conclusion. With all the animals I see on my trail cameras, I think they increase the mystery and excitement of what might be out there.

How can a thread on trail cameras can go on for 12 posts, and have no trail camera photos? To fix that, and to illustrate my point, check my picture of a bald eagle with an injured wing. (No food, no carrion, nothing to put it in front of the camera.) What happened to this eagle is a mystery, and it's always exciting here in these parts to see a bald eagle. She was in front of the camera for over 3 minutes, and in all 5 pictures she is holding her right wing so it doesn't drag on the ground.



There's a nest about 150 yards from here, and another about 400 yards, but they don't use the nests in November.

Is there a hunter anywhere who doesn't do anything to increase the odds of taking an animal? Why aren't we all using spears? Or digging pits and chasing the animals into them?

Steve.

Trail cameras are great for figuring out what or who is living on your back 40. Imagine my surprise when I discovered it was one of the guys who posts to 24hr.

Finally someone got a good picture of Big Foot. Instead of some blurry picture no one can tell if he is real or not.

Fairness isn't a concept that exists in nature. The idea of what is fair and not fair exists only in your head and in your head alone. Go to someone else's head and you'll find a totally different "fair".

In nature, you're either the windshield or the bug. Let's keep game management practices strictly to real numbers instead of bullschit artificial concepts.

Where do you draw the line. Take the scope away. Camo and scent lock clothing/not fair. You have to catch um with your bare hands.

If I could afford them there would be several on the farm just to see what it is that lurks in the night and sets the dog off. We usually have bear tracks in any fresh snow and it would be fun to see what he looks like.

Not really interested in using them for hunting.

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