These devices can serve much the same purpose for citizen scientists and backyard photographers. Trail cameras already play an important role in field research, allowing scientists to remotely monitor habitats and herd movements, as well as in wildlife conservation and land management, for the same reasons. “Our ability to do so was greatly enhanced with the development of photography and other, even more recent, innovations such as small, portable batteries, electric lights, and digital equipment.” “The human desire to observe wild animals without disturbing them goes back at least to hunter-gatherers who constructed blinds,” Kucera and Barrett write in A History of Camera Trapping. Like traditional cameras, trail cams come in a wide variety of shapes, sizes and capabilities, all of which will determine how well the camera works in the environment you put it in. Trail cameras are what you’ve got integrated into your smartphone but in a ruggedized (albeit largely immobile) casing - think, waterproof digital sensors outfitted with laser tripwires and IR vision.

Here’s what to look for to get the most out of your backyard Big Brothering. And for that you’re going to need a trail camera.

But if we’re going to be moving into their habitats and living alongside them anyway, we might as well get to know our furry new neighbors by going full Rear Window to surreptitiously observe their daily (and nightly) lives. Sometimes that’s cute, like Pizza Rat, sometimes it’s not, like Pescadero High’s recent feline transfer student. All prices are correct at the time of publishing.ĭaffodils flourishing in sidewalk cracks, pigeons and starlings congregating on overhead power lines, rats living in your apartment walls - no matter how urban humans strive to make our environments, nature’s flora and fauna will make themselves right at home next to us. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. Some of our stories include affiliate links. All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company.

Cheap trail cameras that work