By Kaleb Comstock
Cellular Cameras have truly changed the way we hunt. There are many benefits of using cell cams, as well as some cons. In some states, cell cams aren’t even legal. In today’s blog, we are going to dive in and discuss the pros and cons of using cellular trail cameras.
Pros
For the most part, when people think of cell cams, they instantly think of all the benefits. I would say there are more positives to using cellular cameras than there are negatives. One of the biggest benefits of using cell cams is you always have the most recent information (MRI). Having MRI makes it easier to plan when you want to hunt because you are already aware of what has been hitting that particular area on your property. An example of using MRI to my advantage was the buck I killed in 2020. I had a cell cam posted on a pinch where the deer walked out of the timber and into the cut corn field. I had my target buck daylight in the cornfield two nights in a row on cell cam. I checked the weather for the next day, December 4th, and saw it was the exact same conditions as the previous two days. I went in on the third day, after having him on camera in daylight back to back days and by 4:35, my target buck had entered the corn field. Without the cell cam, I don’t know if I would have killed that buck because the temperature was mid 50’s in December in Nebraska which is historically very warm. I used MRI to my advantage and was able to shoot my target buck.
Another pro of using cell cams is it is way less intrusive on a property. What I mean by being less intrusive is once that camera is set, you really don’t have to go back into that area until you are ready to hunt. This allows you to keep human scent out of your property which could result in bumping less deer. I personally like to stick my cell cams in the hard to access parts of my properties, or in the area’s that I want to keep as much human scent out of as possible.
A final pro of cell cams that I am going to talk about is the benefits they provide when hunting out of state. Hunting multiple states can be difficult when it comes to scouting. Most of the time, when you roll into the state you’re planning on hunting, you want all of your work already done. While you can use regular trail cameras, it isn’t as easy to keep up on the deer activity as it is with cell cams. An example of this is we just got back from hunting in North Dakota for the season opener. Alex, Luke and Garrett went out a couple of weeks prior to hunting and deployed cell cams. When we rolled into camp to hunt on opener, we had already figured out what bucks we had in the area and where we were going to hunt based on the scouting the cell cams did for us.
Cons
While there are many pros to using cell cams, over the last few years I have also found a couple of cons that you should be aware of. I would say the biggest con about using cell cams is it is easy to get discouraged. Every morning when I wake up, I anxiously check my phone hoping to see a big buck on camera, and every morning I am disappointed when there isn’t the buck I am looking for. Currently, my cell cameras are slow with not much activity on them. I know my cameras are in good spots on my property, I’m just not seeing the deer I would like to see on camera. I know I have personally become too reliant on cell cameras. Just last week I was texting Alex about where to hunt because we were having a big cold front roll in. I had no MRI of any of my target bucks and really didn’t have much hope because of the lacking MRI. One thing I need to remind myself is while cell cams are super helpful, they are still only taking a picture of what’s right in front of the camera.
Cell cams have also kind of taken away the excitement I used to have when it came to checking trail cameras. I remember as a little kid before cell cameras I couldn’t wait to get home to check an SD card. It was one of the most exciting things for me. I have lost that excitement since using cell cameras because I already think I know what bucks are frequenting my area.
Conclusion
Overall, cell cams have completely changed the way I and many other hunters hunt today. They have made scouting and keeping up on the most recent information way more convenient and easier. I am constantly adding more cell cams to my arsenal and will continue to use them as long as they’re legal to help me be successful in the deer woods.
