Pond camera

[Graybeard]

In this thread I'll post some images captured by the game camera I have out near my pond to catch photos of visitors to it.

[Graybeard]

Photo #1 is a doe I call blaze with her fawn.

Photo #2 is the doe I call blaze with  her fawn from this year and one I think was her fawn last year but can't be sure of that.

Photo #3 is blaze and her fawn. That long dark mark on her chest that shows up under IR light is why I call her blaze. She also has another mark forward of it on her shoulder area that when I first saw it looked to be an open hole as if from an arrow with field tip or maybe a limb she stuck in her running. On other side of body she also has a black spot on her leg so I can tell her from that side also.

Photo #4 is an unknown deer traveling near the fence line around the pond.

[Lloyd Smale]

all im getting on mine this year other then bear is 2 does and 2 fawns about every day all day. Havent seen a single buck yet this year.

[Graybeard]

Here is a view of the east cove of the pond taken when I opened the camera to change out the card one day. Photo #1.

Photo #2 is a blue heron that caught a large bream and walked in front of camera one day.

[ironglow]

...   Looks like you have plenty of company there...

[Graybeard]

...   Looks like you have plenty of company there...

Yeah I have lots of visitors on my property.

Matt put out some game cameras here in the blueberry orchard a bunch of years ago and we got some photos of critters but not all that many back then. I just put out four game cameras this year and have been seeing far more animals than we did on the cameras in the orchard.

I have more cameras I plan to put out but at present have 4 cameras out.

I have one on the shooting range, one at the pond, one along my driveway down near the pond and a scrap pile camera where we put table scraps.

I'll set up a thread for the other two perhaps today and get more photos posted up from all of them.

[Ranger99]

They are interesting and entertaining
for sure.
Just don't get like these people in my
area that believe a game camera is the
do-all end-all.
Many around here believe that if it's
not on a game camera, it doesn't exist.
The neighbors and myself have seen
lots of animals that other people say
aren't there because " if they were
there, I'd have it on one of my cameras ".
A worse thing is the many around here
that get a photo of a particular
"trophy " buck, and genuinely believe it
gives them a claim of some kind on
that particular animal. There's been
some really heated arguments around
here over that particular thing

[Graybeard]

For sure we see critters I've not yet caught on camera. Just last night I was looking at the card pulled from the shooting range and saw a rabbit, LOTS of times I saw the rabbit. I know we've had rabbits forever here but that was the first on camera sighting of one.

With all the stray or feral house cats and foxes up there I'm surprised it stayed alive long enough to be seen for 4 days in a row on that camera. I'd have expected to see a rabbit on the pond camera first but that's now what happened.

I'm thinking of putting up a camera to look out over that east cove of the pond to get photos of water birds like ducks, geese and herons among the many that use my pond.

The pond is about 3/4 acre in size. It has a peninsula in the middle reaching out into the pond with the opening out at the far end toward the state highway being perhaps 40' or a bit more. On each side of it are coves like the one pictured above. I call them the east and west coves and they are close to same size tho the east is a little bit larger in area I think but not by much.

Below is a photo from long ago that gives a decent view of the shape of the pond.

[Graybeard]

OK above wasn't as good as I thought.

I'm gonna post a good one from early days on highway side looking back toward my home and barn. First will be the west cove with peninsula also visible on the right side.

Then a photo of the east cove from the same long ago time frame. It too is from highway side looking back at my house/barn with peninsula on the left this time.

Of course these days there are loads of trees, willows, catalpa and sycamore mostly but several other types as well.

[Graybeard]

Pond has not yet fully filled in the above images. I think they were taken within the first year of the pond's existence. I don't recall exactly when I had it built. I just looked and these photos are from 2007.

[Graybeard]

First photo here is of a baby redwinged blackbird. They like to nest down at the pond, less so these days than in the earlier years.

Next is a good photo of cattail island so named long ago due to the cattails that grew on the dirt on top of all those limestone rocks. Water is quite low when this photo was taken. At pond full level all this is underwater.

Next I'm standing on cattail island looking back more or less to the northwest. Out across the pastures are the homes of some neighbors.

And last for this post is a photo of the peninsula as seen from the highway side looking back toward my home and barn.

All these were taken when pond was still filling up for first time. All that supplies water to it is rainwater runoff from all the areas you can see around it.

[Lloyd Smale]

i think of blue herons with the same respect i do a liberal. Theyve a couple times decimated the fish population in my pond. They are now targets of opportunity.

Here is a view of the east cove of the pond taken when I opened the camera to change out the card one day. Photo #1.

Photo #2 is a blue heron that caught a large bream and walked in front of camera one day.

[Graybeard]

Here are some other feathered visitors to the pond:

[Bob Riebe]

What kind of duck is picture 3?

[billy_56081]

Muscovie maybe?

[Graybeard]

It might be a Muscovy duck or it might just be a domestic duck of someone's that flew into my pond. I found a photo on Pintrest that looked to be nearly identical but since I don't have an account there I couldn't view it to see what they called it.

Over the years a lot of interesting critters have shown up at the pond and I sure haven't been able to ID all of them. This duck is one of those I've never positively identified.

[Bob Riebe]

Muscovie maybe?

I do believe so, thanks.

Dad's dad, raised them on the farm and he said they had a tendency when coming in to land in the pond, they would come so close to his head he could feel and hear the wind.

[Mrs Graybeard]

I am a member of pinterest & I was able to see the picture of the duck & it is called Piebald Muscovy Duck.

[Lloyd Smale]

nice to see you posting. I miss your recipes on the food section. One thing i learned in the service was you southern women sure can cook.

I am a member of pinterest & I was able to see the picture of the duck & it is called Piebald Muscovy Duck.

[Graybeard]

First picture is my grandson Wyatt, Matt's youngest boy and his just older half brother running thru the blueberry orchard on their way down to the pond. The photos in this post are from May 2006. Wyatt is the blond headed kid.

Then second is them at the pond playing in the water which they did a lot in those long ago days.

Last is Wyatt on my 4 wheeler.

[Bob Riebe]

Pheww, Mr. Graybeard, good to hear those are your family; for a second I thought you had feral Crumbcrunchers running wild.

[Graybeard]

Well I can tell ya back in those days when they were little they sure were crumb crunchers and sure ran wild around here. They always wanted something to eat and some Kool-Aid to drink each time they went thru the house.

Wyatt especially always loved blueberry season, that boy loves blueberries. So does his dad, Matt and the youngest grandchild Maya our only grand daughter.

[Mule 11]

Well I can tell ya back in those days when they were little they sure were crumb crunchers and sure ran wild around here. They always wanted something to eat and some Kool-Aid to drink each time they went thru the house.

Wyatt especially always loved blueberry season, that boy loves blueberries. So does his dad, Matt and the youngest grandchild Maya our only grand daughter.

My boy loves blackberries and my daughter eats enough ramen noodles that I should buy stock in it.
We buy frozen blueberries and the blueberry muffin, pancake  or bagel is the current trend here although not as good as locally produced or homegrown...

[Graybeard]

Having our own blueberry orchard is nice. I just ramble around thru the orchard on either the mower, tractor or my JD Gator and pick them and eat them without even getting off of whatever I'm riding at the time.

We used to open it to the public for them to pick and we even picked for some customers in the early days when we were younger. It first got to where we couldn't do the picking and had to go "you pick" only. Then eventually it got to where I just wasn't able to keep it as clean and neat as I felt it should be if I am to let folks in so we just shut it down.

At one time we had over 500 bushes but now prolly half that or less. We allow family and a few friends to come pick for free but I make no attempt to keep it neat and cleanly and freshly mowed anymore. What we don't eat the critters do. Birds love them and I'm sure so do the squirrels and deer.

This year I beat the squirrels to my walnuts, last year they beat me to them. It all works out in the end.

[oldandslow]

My # 2 great grand daughter is a blueberry eating little machine. Our only source is the grocery store and she eats more of them than I do. We also keep some little container of yogurt for afternoon snacks. If she is around they are fair game anytime of the day.

By the way, that's a nice mud hole. 

[Graybeard]

Being fed strictly by rainwater runoff it at times has been little more than a mudhole. I think twice since I had it dug it has gone so low most of the fish in it died. Neither time did it totally dry up tho so some survived in the two deepest areas of it and enough survived to repopulate.

I can't say with a certainty what is in it right now but I have stocked it with black crappie, blue gill, shell cracker, bass, catfish and grass carp.

We sometimes see bass that look to weigh in the 3-4 pound range cruising the shallows and catfish that large and larger have been caught from it a couple years ago so they should be even bigger now. I think I have a couple of older grass carp that might be close to 35" long at least I saw them back in the spring.

I've not seen or caught a crappie since I stocked either 200 or 300 can't recall which. That was perhaps 5 years ago so they should be in the 3 pound or so range by now if still in there. Of course the big bass and catfish could have eaten them all when I stocked them. I had to run off a bass that looked to me to be in the 5-6 pound range in the east cove when I was putting them in.

I have a black cypress tree in the water in that east cove and a river birch on the bank that is really too near to it. Big bass seem to love that general area around that cypress and in the shade of it and the birch.

No one has really done any fishing down there in a year or two. I seem to have about stopped fishing. Matt told me earlier this year he was gonna come over one day and catch a bunch and have a fish fry and freeze some but hasn't do so yet.

I'm gonna toss in a couple photos of some kid caught fish down there.