I am a new Member here on the Forum and live in upstate NY, about an hour southeast from Syracuse, NY.
More than 20 years ago now, I purchased a piece of nearby rural wooded property for hunting/recreation. About 69 acres.
Back then when I was still working, if you got cold when deer hunting, you warmed up in the vehicle you arrived in.
Now I am retired, and moved from the "city" life, out into the country. My new home is about 20 miles/30 minutes driving time away from the hunting/recreational property.
My home is on a one acre lot, but I have cornfields and woods as neighbors.
After retiring, I decided to make something of the rural hunting/recreational property. I bought several Kubota tractors, and a large double axle steel trailer for hauling the tractors.
Shortly after acquiring the new home, my Girlfriend and I found a local contractor who built sheds. They also do a two story cabin, build the first floor remotely, bring it to the cabin site on a big hydraulic trailer.
With a five man crew, they assemble the second story and roof on top of what arrived on the big trailer in only one day. Two days total, bring, setup 1st floor, add second story and they are done.
So with only a six week lead time, we had a new cabin on the 69 acre parcel. It was an empty shell other than a staircase.
We hired an electrician for dealing with the power company, installing the circuit breaker panel, and coordinating several electrical inspections.
We dug the buried in conduit electrical entrance cable run from the transformer/power pole to the cabin with our Kubota backhoe as an additional cost savings measure.
Everything else, we did ourselves. The cabin has a 200 amp electrical service, and we have added many other luxury items. (luxuries as pertaining to a deer hunting cabin)
Big wood stove for heat, electric baseboard heat for making the insurance company happy, electric range, refrigerator, microwave, king size bed, custom kitchen table, wheeled, bowling alley table top.
Sometime later, we added fiber optic into the home broadband internet, and running water into the cabin during seasonable temperatures.
The cabin still is uninsulated, as the big wood stove forces the door/windows to be open, even when down near zero F.
We do not heat the cabin when it is vacant, so the water system is drained/shut off in winter.
After getting the internet installed, I got a Verizon network extender from their customer service. It hooks up to the broadband internet with a LAN cable, and the network extender creates a 200' radius cell tower signal from the black plastic box. The cabin is so rural, no native "over the air" cell signal from one of the normal big steel cell towers is available.
We figured, people out hunting, operating machinery, the ability for making an emergency 911 call might be nice.
After getting operational cell signal at the cabin, I looked around to see what was available on the market for Cellular trail cameras, that didn't break the bank with operational expenses.
After some research, I zeroed in on Cuddeback/Cuddelink cellular trail cameras.
Most, if not all other cellular trail cameras require a cell data plan for each deployed trail camera. The dollars add up quickly! Ten cameras, ten cell data plans, OUCH!
Cuddeback/Cuddelink is totally different. When you purchase their equipment, you need two items.
1.) A "Home" unit, it serves as a picture collection device from all the deployed cameras in the woods. The cell data plan you buy, is for this unit only.
The deployed woods cameras send the pictures they take up the "daisy chain" of deployed woods cameras, until they reach the "Home" unit. Using a secure "mesh" Wi-Fi connection for interconnecting the deployed woods cameras.
2.) Trail cameras. You can run one woods camera, or up to 23 woods cameras. With only one "Home" unit and one cell data plan. My setup? More than one, less than twenty three.
Trail camera pictures can be viewed from anyplace in the world that you have a cellular or internet connection. In my case, I have pictures arrive from 20 miles away, with absolutely no need for pulling SD cards out of cameras.
It's MAGIC!
I also have one camera deployed for surveillance of the cabin, property gate, and road frontage viewing. Surveillance (camera setting) pictures arrive within several minutes of when taken.
Deer/game pictures arrive in "blocks" four times per day. You can also configure the system for taking daily "verify" pictures, low resolution/small bandwidth for receiving daily "proof" that the system and each camera, is operational.
That new-to-me Henry Big Boy brass rifle in .44 Magnum that I recently acquired? Some time after opening day when the weather is decent, it will get some woods time!
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cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr
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