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flash cameras and some help

Lucky13

Lucky13

Member
Now im sure this has been talked about several times but my search did not come up with much...I bought the covert MP-E5 this year and have been running it all fall...i am new to the digital cameras as i have been out of the deer hunting game for some time now...I bought this camera because it was cheap and recommened by a guy at scheels back in nodak...so after running it all fall i keep getting more and more frustrated with the night time pic quality and just flat out missing shots, for instance i pulled my card today and had a very nice buck off just a bit too far from the camera but the recovery time is sooooo slow that i never got a good pic of him...frustrating!!!
So i am in the market for several cameras...now here is what i want to know...the camera i have now is an IR cam so it eases my mind in knowing that the flash wont spook deer...BUT does it actually spook deer...
I want a camera that takes good pics plain and simple....
So does flash spook deer? When cameras are "flash" cameras does that mean that they emit a white flash like a handheld camera? should a guy stick to IR flash? Black flash?
I feel like im thinking way too hard in this but after the card pull today ive about had it...I had 180 pics in 5 days which i was excited about up until I had to delete 100 pics that were either blank or too hard to make out
so you guys that have been running cameras regularly what does all this mean and what camera should i buy?
thanks!!
 
White flash some deer don't mind it but a lot seems to spook from it. Emits a flash like your handheld camera you can see. Regular IR has a red glow, deer seem to notice it. Some seem to spook from what I can tell. Black flash emits no light, never tried it but want to. Supposed to be the ticket.

I like the moultrie line of cameras, the m80 and been wanting to try their black flash. lots of great cams out there these days though.
 
Deer don't really mind the flash on my cameras. In fact I think it attracts them because they are curious to what it is. I've seen plenty of deer walk by it with out acknowledging it.
 
It is said that the flash spooks deer but after years of running both I have not noticed any difference in the amount of pics or mature bucks on the two. Flash cams take soooo much better night pics that I prefer them to IRs. the only downfall to flash is that people can see the flash which can lead to theft. I have had two cams stolen over the past few years and both were flash cams.
 
I ran flash cameras since when they used 35mm film and don't think they spooked deer out of the area. Got pix of many deer over & over again. However, a few years ago I was sitting in the shack with my wife during late muzzy looking over a soybean plot. Through the wood we saw a nice big 10 point that was high on the hit list coming our way. As he went through a little ditch crossing just before entering the field we saw the camera that was there flash. Got a great picture of him... There were just under 50 deer in the field that night but "Big 10" was not among them. He turned around & walked away. I've got all IR or black flash now (but the night photos suck).
 
Some pics are bad enough that I go to video now over pics. I would like a few of the white flash models.
 
Thinkin Rut said:
If I were buying 5 cams, 3 would be flash. I would either build my own or buy them from someone who builds them on the side. Saskguy has some of the better pics on here, he may point you in the right direction. FIREMANJIM builds homebrews also...
http://www.jtswildlifecameras.com/
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Which one of the "home brew" cameras firemanjim builds do you like or would recommend? I don't have food plots just natural setting, the pack rat maybe?
 
HorseDoctor said:
I ran flash cameras since when they used 35mm film and don't think they spooked deer out of the area. Got pix of many deer over & over again. However, a few years ago I was sitting in the shack with my wife during late muzzy looking over a soybean plot. Through the wood we saw a nice big 10 point that was high on the hit list coming our way. As he went through a little ditch crossing just before entering the field we saw the camera that was there flash. Got a great picture of him... There were just under 50 deer in the field that night but "Big 10" was not among them. He turned around & walked away. I've got all IR or black flash now (but the night photos suck).
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I hate to think about how much I spent on film and developing with the original camtrakkers, 36 pictures at a time.
 
6x6 said:
I hate to think about how much I spent on film and developing with the original camtrakkers, 36 pictures at a time.
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Haha! No kidding, I actually did slides with my 35mm - now that's a painful and expensive lifestyle. My wife constantly complained about it, and I would say " I don't drink or smoke honey" it's my only vice. Digital is so nice!
 
I run one flash and a few IR. I don't think deer spook as much from the flash or the IR glow (red) as they do from the clunk the cameras make when they start up to take the pic (not sure if all do this, but I don't have hundreds into each cam either!). My flash camera has a pretty long delay between pics, so I've switched to running it in video mode this year. It does video during daylight, and still pics during dark. My complaint about the IR cams is the washout that occurs on objects close to the camera, but I can set them to do multiple shots at once, which I like. You can get different angles of the racks if they are turning their head that way.
 
The flash on the old white flashes and the IR will spook mature deer especially once they shed their velvet...which is obviously the most important time. I'm running mostly all Moultrie black flashes next year, didn't run any cams this year during the season just because of negative past experiences with mature bucks getting out of dodge after seeing the flash. I love getting a picture of a big buck and then the next one is him 30 yards away looking back at the camera with his ears popped up....kidding.

If you don't want to dish out the coin for the new black flash cameras my suggestion would be to get a tree mount and get your cameras up about 8' or so out of the line of sight of the deer. I have a couple of good IR cams that I really like still and will be mounting those up in the tree this year.
 
SEIowaDeerslayer said:
The flash on the old white flashes and the IR will spook mature deer especially once they shed their velvet...which is obviously the most important time. I'm running mostly all Moultrie black flashes next year, didn't run any cams this year during the season just because of negative past experiences with mature bucks getting out of dodge after seeing the flash. I love getting a picture of a big buck and then the next one is him 30 yards away looking back at the camera with his ears popped up....kidding. If you don't want to dish out the coin for the new black flash cameras my suggestion would be to get a tree mount and get your cameras up about 8' or so out of the line of sight of the deer. I have a couple of good IR cams that I really like still and will be mounting those up in the tree this year.
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Great information! Thanks!
 
im starting to get the understanding of the flashes and whether or not the deer are spooked off the flash i guess thats up in the air...so i will probably go with the black flash on the new cams for this upcomming year....i dont mind the IR if the deer are within that 10 ft mark but as well all know that doesnt always cut it
 
I have all ir cams now, and I run them on a 3 photo sequence. If a deer is close you can tell that they still spook from them. I think in my case it's the sound of the filter being moved. It's always the older bucks to so it's a double wammy. I've built a ton of cameras in my day and the Sony homebrews were by far the highest quality photos. Used to be the only thing that I cared about.
 
I can run any kind of camera because I build them. Currently have 37 out right now. Every cam I build gets tested for 2 weeks on a tree in the real world. So therefore I get to see thousands of pics from every kind of camera out there and here is what I have learned over the 8 years I have been in this business. Deer are like people. They are all different and all react differently. I have pics of a 190" beast who was very photogenic. Came and got his pic took for hours every night from a white flash unit. Did not bother him at all. I have also seen other deer freak out from white flash. I think most deer think it is lightning and seem to not mind. With that being said, the ir leds that glow red and can be seen are horrible DEER HAT THEM!!! That is why I do not build nor do I offer units with the 850nm leds. Deer are terrified of them. The blackflash units are AWESOME!! But only if you are doing video. The motion blurr from black flash still pics is horrible. The shutter has to stay open for so long to gather enough light if the critters move at all the pictures have motion blurr. Just not acceptable to me. The ir flash cams are awesome too like my Camo Cadillac unit. Basically it is a whiteflash covered with ir filter material. Wonderful pictures and the deer pay no attention to it. If you are looking directly at it when the flash fires you can see a faint purple blip. Well I hope this opinion helps. Thanks...
 
IR is the way to go, we have seen and proven that white flash does play a negative roll on mature deer. Some will get use to it, but most will avoid the area. IR night photos are very low quality, hopefully the technology will catch up. Check out coverts MP6 Black, nice camera.

www.trailcamtrophies.com
 
100% flash cameras will spook certain deer. It depends on the deers personality. I've watched whitetails not react and I've seen others literally jump 6 feet in the air and run away. I've noticed that mature deer become camera shy much more than others. Also worth noting is that they became camera shy to black IR just a such as the red IR. I think they just notice something different in their environment. Deer will notice the red IR but typically you get a follow up pic or two with them as opposed to only one with a flash camera.
 
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So deer are scared of red LEDs but they are fine with a purple "blip". Just making sure I got that right?
 
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