I spend a lot of time in my yard, or at least a lot of time looking out the window at my yard – probably more than most people. But even so, there is so much time when I’m not able to observe the comings and goings of animals on my property. This is particularly true at night – when I’m asleep and many of our local mammals are more active. I can only watch for so much of the day, but a little bit of technology can help fill in the gaps. A recent gift of a game camera has provided new insights into the presence and behavior of our backyard wildlife.

For the first five weeks or so, I experimented with setting it up in various places around our yard. I was surprised and delighted to see how actively our property was used by a number of animals. I knew we had eastern cottontails but was unaware how many and how active they were in certain areas of the yard. With no delicious weeds or wildflowers growing in our front yard in the winter, I see them very seldom this time of year. But they’re clearly still here. It was also no surprise that there are gray squirrels in the yard – they’re a fairly constant presence on the property and were the most frequent animals to set off the camera.

But there were others I had been less aware of: a red fox that passed through once, a raccoon, and quite a bit of eastern coyote action. For me it was most interesting to learn the regular routes they took and where they entered and exited the yard. The video below provides a reel of photograph and video highlights from this first few weeks of testing my new camera in the yard.

After some very exciting test runs at home, I deployed the camera in a local conservation area to see what I could find in the “wild”. I didn’t get as much action, but did manage to locate a game trail that is at least occasionally used by coyotes. The video below shows a pretty amazing capture of a pair of coyotes. While collecting the SD card from the camera today, I also noticed fisher tracks nearby. Perhaps I’ll catch a glimpse of it soon.