Varmints on WeaselCam

My two camera boxes are in the garden to look for weasels and stoats but I occasionally put in a few seeds to attract smaller animals and the cameras then record voles, mice and shrews.  I recently added larger outer entrance pipes, hoping to entice in a passing stoat but instead less welcome visitors have taken advantage.

Intruders caught on OtterCam

I have had up to five cameras set to watch the otters in the past month but of course they catch anything else going by. Birds that have triggered the cameras on this small path include robin, wren, moorhen, water rail, redwing, song thrush, blackbird, mute swan, jay, magpie and sparrowhawk.  Mammals other than otters have been roe deer, red fox, badger, brown rat, bank vole and wood mouse.  Here they are in descending order of size.

On one occasion the otter sniffed the air, decided not to come out of the water, and swam off. Moments later a fox came by so the otter may have smelt it and chosen to avoid it.  The video also shows well the relative size of an otter and a fox.

Up close with RatCam

I have been experimenting.  One of the limitations of most trail cameras is their inability to focus closer than about 2m. Often the otters are closer to the camera than that and are consequently out of focus.  I had already adapted the Browning cameras I use with a rain hood made from flexible plastic covered with camouflaged gaffer tape.

To allow closer focus I have now also fitted them with high tech close focus lenses, using a lens from +1.25 dioptre reading glasses from the pound shop.  

And it seems to work well.  Although I have managed a few brief otter pictures the main problem so far has been getting the otter into the right place facing the right way as the field of view is necessarily now restricted.  In the meantime I have managed some great rat footage.  These are frame grabs from video.

Rats are not my favourite animals and they are a real nuisance in the reedbeds as they often steal the sardines before the otter(s) turn up.  However, they are intelligent resourceful animals and are part of the great scheme of things.  I have seen them pretty much wherever I have tried to find otters so there are plenty of them about - on a bad night I can end up with 150 rat video clips!  While I am waiting for better otter footage the rats have at least proved that the close focus works.  Not bad for plastic lenses costing 50p each.

This shows how the focus is still pretty good when the rat is fairly close to the camera.

Watch this video right to the end.

I also got a brief glimpse of a tawny owl but unfortunately it was very close to the camera and out of focus.  The reaction time of the camera is said to be around 0.5s and the owl was gone after 2s so it was a very quick strike.

The owl took off very quickly but going frame by frame I can see there is a mouse in its talons.  A pity it wasn't a rat.

I'll keep on experimenting and post better otter pictures if I get some.

More from OtterCam

A couple of weeks ago I had two or three cameras in for seven consecutive nights and recorded otters on every camera on every night.  The cameras are set to record video but do allow frame grabs, although these were less impressive than they have been with the foxes.

The best of the videos were recorded earlier in the week and were posted previously.  Most of the later recordings showed one otter at a time searching for food or eating.  Here is an example.

Although the videos were generally good quality the still camera didn't manage much.  It is really tricky to get the otter in the right place, facing the right way.  These two were the best of the bunch.  From its shape I think this is the mother.

This one is probably a pup.

All the cameras recorded lots of rat pictures as well.  I'll spare you the videos but here are a couple of stills.

Although we are sometimes lucky enough to see an otter during the day, all the recent recordings were during night time.  I am encouraged by this recent experience and plan to use the cameras a couple of nights every month to see what the otters are up to.  If I see anything interesting I'll post it here.

RatCam

After the success of FoxCam, BadgerCam, and DeerCam I bring you RatCam.  Not quite what I was hoping for.