For the past several months, I have been keeping track of the nighttime visitors to our yard in Virginia. Last fall I purchased two Wosada Trail Cameras from Amazon. They’re fairly inexpensive, (49.95 each) they take SD cards and run on eight AA batteries.

I purchased two of them: one for the gate to my side yard and one for the back fence.

Alexandria has a problem feral cat colony in the Arlandria/North Del ray section of the city. Since the Pandemic started, feral cats have started visiting my yard, drawn by my bird feeders and the mice, chipmunks and squirrels that live off of the spilled seeds on the ground.

I’ve since moved the thistle feeder to the center of the yard and am retiring the Brome bird feeder as soon as all of the sunflower seeds are gone. (I buy 40 pound bags, so it takes a while)  The Brome feeders are incredibly well made. they’re from Quebec and the company offers spare parts and service for years. I’ve basically rebuilt my 22 year-year old feeder several times with spares from Brome. Exceptional company.

I change the positions of the cameras every few days, just to see if the animals are coming or going by a different route. Amazon offers a mix of trail cameras from inexpensive to the type you bolt to a tree in the woods and film in 4K. I have one of those, but for this project, I wanted something that was easy to use, did not require a password to use and if it broke, no big deal.  Brome Bird Feeders and Wosoda Trail Cameras.