SpyPoint Flex-S (solar) Long Term Project

[356]

Background: Nine years ago I purchased 40 acres in a rural part of southern Missouri sight unseen. The property borders a remote part of the Mark Twain National Forest. Satellite imagery showed ample game movement from the forest to a pond on the property. It has been eight years since I visited the property. It is currently on a grazing lease, and rotational grazing of the property takes place twice a year. The first year I put up some cameras and had some amazing pictures. Since that time those cameras have not been touched, and I can only hope the SD cards may be OK, but am not holding my breath.

The Purchase: I picked up two SpyPoint Flex-S (solar) cameras. The cell coverage on the property is marginal, and some areas had ATT signals, and others Verizon. The flex will connect with the best carrier. The built in solar and lithium battery will address the fact that these cameras will likely not get touched for three years once deployed. The "instant picture" feature allows real time testing to ensure things are OK. Plus, the plan I have provides 200 pictures per camera, per month, for free (perk of the insider membership, which doubles the free pictures). I currently have several SpyPoint Link-S cameras and they have never gone below 50% charge, so I am hoping for similar results.

The Plan: In partnership with a deer organization, a deer specialist and volunteer will be surveying the property due to its unique location, and deploy the cameras at locations TBD. The project will help assess potential impact of hunting pressure on public land. Additional cameras will be used by the organization. The survey will include looking for evidence of human activity, and provide a baseline summary of deer and other wildlife use.

The Future: As noted, I bought the property sight unseen, knowing the deed did not include easements or access outside of the National Forest. Since Missouri mandates access, I was able to negotiate a very nice grazing lease with the cattle rancher who thought he owned the property (and put in the pond). The lease provides our family and those I authorize access through the network of two-tracks on the property. A battle with cancer and subsequent purchase of the farm we now live on negated the property to " investment status" over hunting land. My aspiration, Lord willing, is to begin hunting the property in 2026. My dream retirement gift will be to take our camper to the property and hunt it for the first time opening week of that year. I am hoping the survey supports the hypothesis that hunting pressure in the National Forest moves deer from public to this piece of private. The nearest access miles away, but there are some forest trails 2 miles from the property. We are also interested in seeing which critters use the pond regularly, as there are not many water sources in this area. I know from the first year survey that bear, deer, coyotes are frequent visitors.

I plan to update this thread with reports on how the SpyPoint Flex-S cameras are fairing.

 

[bwoods11]

Looks nice ! Enjoy the property!

 

[356]

Thanks. The SpyPoint Flex-S cameras are scheduled to be deployed on August 31st. I am looking forward to the three year study. I tested them both and they seem to work well. I really like the “instant picture” setting to ensure the camera are working and placed just right.

 

[Wind Gypsy]

Interested to see the results and the property story is intriguing. Whether a reasonably priced cell cam can stay running for 3 years without maint will be interesting. It seems like many have little issues but some just keep ticking.

Whats your guess as far as trespassers go out there? The story from the guy who's hunting cabin was burned down in the ozarks a couple years back https://www.themeateater.com/conser...spect-arrested-for-burning-down-hunting-cabin has burned a stereotype in my brain about what things are like in the Ozarks but is it completely different around the mark twain NF?

 

[356]

This place is pretty remote, and there are no cabins or homes near the property. The cattle rancher has 5000 acres, and the property is on the south border of his property and the north border of the 1.5 MILLION acre National Forest. So, there is a lot of pubic and private hand to go through to get to the property, and three locked gates (at a minimum) if you drive. Very few folks on the national forest side would enter onto our private, although that is a possibility. The closest foot access is 2 miles after walking a long access trail by a river, and a person would have to go through some pretty heavy timber in a "non-institutive" direction to wind up at our property.

I followed the tragic story of Brandon Butler's cabin being burnt down. I participate in an annual deer camp with some great guys from church. One of them does the Living the Dream podcast, and was a friend of Brandon's. We hunt close to where that took place. We have encountered several poachers during deer camp...some hunt right through our camp at night with their spotlights. Seldom do the poachers work hard to get off ATV access roads.

In closing, your stereo-type of the Ozarks are grounded in some degree of reality. There is a newer generation of hunter/conservationists out there, and our voices are getting louder. However, it is taking time to turn the tide and there are still some bad apples who like to claim "I'm poaching for food" as if their family needs the protein, yet they only take the backstops and leave the rest to rot.

 

[Kooch]

I don’t have the new Flex cameras, but my SPYPOINT cellular cameras need a reboot now and then. They just stop connecting to the network randomly even in an area with very strong signal.

I have one link dark cellular that still works. The link micro cameras have been more reliable for me.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[356]

While not a picture of deer or wildlife, here are two photos from the SpyPoint Flex-S cameras placed by the team.





Here is the first deer on the survey:

 

[356]

A nice 3 1/2 or 4 1/2 showed up today. This is what I bought the property for….so far, the Flex-S is working great.

 

[356]

My first "user error" on one of the SpyPoint Flex-S was leaving one camera on new "Instant Mode." This useful setting allows one to take an instant picture from the camera or computer/phone, which is great for setting up the system. However, if left on instant, the camera is on all of the time. I reset one camera, but not the other. Thus, the lithium backup batteries are dead, and the solar got down to 0%. It is slowing charging and is now at 6% and the camera is operational again. Since I may not be on this property for some time (years?), the built in solar battery will get a good testing.



I did get another nice buck on the camera before the batteries died.

 

[356]

Interested to see the results and the property story is intriguing. Whether a reasonably priced cell cam can stay running for 3 years without maint will be interesting. It seems like many have little issues but some just keep ticking.

Whats your guess as far as trespassers go out there? The story from the guy who's hunting cabin was burned down in the ozarks a couple years back https://www.themeateater.com/conser...spect-arrested-for-burning-down-hunting-cabin has burned a stereotype in my brain about what things are like in the Ozarks but is it completely different around the mark twain NF?

The guys who did the survey were unable to find the two cameras I put out eight years ago, nor did they see the ladder stand I put up on the north side of the pond. These could have been taken by the ranch-hands on the property or trespassers. Another possibility is the they simply could not find them.

 

[356]

Of the two deployed cameras, one has already failed. The supposed user error I reported was not the issue, and is likely an internal issue, as the camera burned through the auxiliary batteries in three days and the solar is not charging. SpyPoint was unable to help—in fact—their support system leaves much to desire as it is a chat-based system with staff who do not seem to understand the concept of “the camera is seven hours away…that is why I purchased a solar-based camera.” Since it is totally dead, someone needs to physically “turn on” the camera, since that can not be done remotely.

Since 14 hours (round trip) to retrieve the camera is unrealistic, I am now down to the one camera. At this time it is working fine and pulls about 15 pictures per day. Here is another new buck on a foggy morning:

 

[356]

It’s Alive! The ”dead” SpyPoint Flex-S is operational again and shows 50% battery on solar. This should be interesting, as the camera no longer has backup batteries. My other SpyPoint solars do not allow for backup batteries, so hopefully it will fully charge and keep up.

 

[West_Fork]

It’s Alive! The ”dead” SpyPoint Flex-S is operational again and shows 50% battery on solar. This should be interesting, as the camera no longer has backup batteries. My other SpyPoint solars do not allow for backup batteries, so hopefully it will fully charge and keep up.

View attachment 57170

I have a stealth cam that did something similar. I had it on instant running 24 hours a day and it depleted the solar battery in just a few days. I set it to run at night only and report out twice a day, then the solar battery got back to 100%, and then I switched it back to instant and 24 hours and the solar has remained 90% or better since.

 

[356]

The camera that was depleted is back off line, so I don’t know if it is a bad camera or not. The good news is that I will be providing the NDA person doing the survey with a new set of Lithium batteries and new Micro-SD card to see if we can reboot the camera. The second SpyPoint was placed in a bad spot and took thousands of pictures of weeds blowing in the wind. That camera will be relocated. So far we have seen one older buck, several 3 1/2 and younger bucks and does. The buck/doe ratio is pretty good based on the limited number of usable pictures.

 

[356]

The dead SpyPoint Flex-S will be coming in from the field. It is either a bad micro-SD card that is causing the camera to expend all of its battery power trying to write to the card or a bad camera. For this season we will be swapping the one Flex-S with a SpyPoint Link-S that is a proven camera over the past two years.

 

[356]

The dead SpyPoint Flex-S has been retrieved and one of my reliable Link-Micro S cameras replaced it. However, sometime Sunday night or Monday morning between 10 pm and 2 am, both cameras went “off line.”

Whats your guess as far as trespassers go out there? The story from the guy who's hunting cabin was burned down in the ozarks a couple years back https://www.themeateater.com/conser...spect-arrested-for-burning-down-hunting-cabin has burned a stereotype in my brain about what things are like in the Ozarks but is it completely different around the mark twain NF?

The cabin that Wind Gypsy refers to is about 30 miles from this property, but there are some “bad dudes” in Texas and Howell counties. While on the property Saturday, we found evidence of vandalism and ladder blind theft.

Missing was the ladder stand, two old Moultrie cameras and all of the posted“ signs were torn down. When scouting the National Forest land we found what appears to be my ladder stand 60 yards into the national forest, along with a corn feeder (both illegal since on National Forest land). We took pictures and contacted the conservation agent who is going to investigate. I will also ask him to also verify that the two cameras are truly missing and not just malfunctioning.




Illegal ladder stand and feeder on National Forest land 60 yards from my property line.

 

[West_Fork]

Sounds familiar. Thankful for drought years when I can go and find a lot of the signs that have been torn down over the years.

 

[356]

Camera Updates: I retrieved the "dead" SpyPoint Flex-S. I started by reformatted the micro-SD card, then checked the charge of the built-in lithium battery (good) and put in 8 new AA lithium "back up" batteries. After reactivating the camera, I redeployed it on our farm, so if the camera has hiccups I can retrieve it without a 5 hour drive.

The other SpyPoint Flex-S was relocated to another part of the property and is communicating fine. However, the status bar us showing 0% on the solar charged lithium battery which is built-in and 100% on the back-up lithium batteries. I know the location is not great for sun, but it shouldn't be 0% on the solar. The pictures it is sending are good quality.

Picture from the SpyPoint Flex-S


Sadly, "Old Reliable" the SpyPoint Link-Micro S that replaced the SpyPoint Flex-S that was dead has not communicated since last Sunday. After sending 5 pictures after being deployed, it has gone silent. It could be bad cell service, but the last status update showed 90% signal.

 

[356]

Day 50 Update: Both SpyPoint Flex-S cameras are currently working “as designed.” The issue with the camera that went dead was resolved with a 10 hour round trip drive and a new micro-SD card.

Status wise, the camera that is still conducting the survey on the remote property shows “0%” for the built-in solar battery. I am not confident this is correct as the AAs always show 100%. The pictures from the camera are good.



The camera with the updated micro-SD card is now on our farm and is working very well. I have used it is both picture and video mode and am pleased with the quality—especially of the videos.



SpyPoint Flex-S Pros (so far):
Cost: This is a feature rich mid-range camera ($170) with a free data plan that is ideal for off-season survey and maintenance (100 pictures per month) and the option of a $99 annual membership that gives 250 pictures per month for an unlimited number of cameras (I am running 8 SpyPoints, so “3000 pictures per year” for $99 across eight cameras. Larger data plans are in-line with most providers.
Picture and Video: The Hi-Rez pictures are on-demand, and provide excellent detail. I’ve used this on a few potential target bucks and turkey. Video quality is good—not sure how much better than my 10 year old Moultrie’s, but no complaints.
Ease of Setup: Compared to the Moultrie and Cuddeback systems, this is a breeze. It’s pretty much “charge internal battery, scan the barcode with your phone, follow the simple setup process, set camera out and turn camera on.” The instant picture feature is very helpful for ensuring the camera is picking up the image you want.

SpyPoint Flex-S Cons (so far):
One camera failed after 10 pictures due to a failed SpyPoint Micro-SD card. This required a 10 hour round trip to retrieve the camera.
The other camera shows “0%” on the internal solar battery. Not sure what is causing this. The good news is the camera works fine and the AA backups are always showing 100%.
Customer Service: Plan on being frustrated….heavy international accents, some struggle with English, don’t seem to understand the concept of “the camera is 5 hours away.” I mentioned this at least four time and the agent repeated, “Do you have the camera in hand.”

I also have a regular (Non-solar) SpyPoint Flex that is working well. It has been deployed over one year now and is used on video only. Battery life on 8 AA Alkaline (not lithium) is about 5 months in a location that gets about 10-15 videos per day. I read that Lithiums work well in these cameras and give about 1 year old service. The regular Flex does not have the “instant picture” feature, but can be set to send pictures “as they come in” which works good for set up, but does have a delay of several minutes.

 

[356]

Survey and Camera Update:
The original SpyPoint Flex-S that stayed in the field continues to perform well. The other camera that had to come in from the field (10 hour round trip) is working well on the farm property after a new micro-SD card and recharge of the lithium battery.

The replacement camera—one of my “old reliable” SpyPoint Link-Micro-LTE-Solars was working for a while, then stopped from 10-8-23 until today, 1-28-24 when it started sending pictures from 1-21-24 to the present. The status shows the camera is charged, so I have updated some of the settings to enhance battery life.

As for the Survey, I have been pleased with the quantity of deer and turkey activity, and have pictures of additional critters, including coyotes, fox, bobcats and cattle. Age class is so-so, with only one 4 y.o. & and couple of 3 y.o. deer captured during the survey so far.