Mountain goat trail cam (rutting goats and winter goats on camera)!

[shanevg]

I've been hoping to get a good goat cam up for years now and finally found a spot that was good for it. Unfortunately, the spot is tough to access, especially in the winter as it is deep in the Mt. Baker Wilderness. I was able to ski into the spot this last weekend and was really happy with some of the pictures I got.

Even though I've never personally seen a billy this low on the mountain, I got some really nice billies on the camera in November.

I even got some rutting action on camera!

 

[shanevg]

The billies then hung out in that spot for another couple of weeks. Living in that snow would not be easy!

 

[shanevg]

Notice the classic rutting billy dirty rump.

And all clean post rut.

From mid-December to mid-March there were no goats in the spot. Then the nannies show up in the spring as they get ready to give birth.

 

[shanevg]

I did get some pics of the goats when we went in to check the camera. I'll try to post those pictures after I do some editing. Hope you enjoyed the goat cam pics. Not every day you get good goat pics during the rut or on a trail cam period.

 

[BuckSnort]

Very Cool pictures!

 

[JG358]

Nice Pics!

 

[Yukondog]

Amazing pics. Congrats on picking the right spot to hang your camera.

 

[Bearhunter]

Awesome pics, you are not doing me any favors, as I want to get up there so bad now!! haha

 

[Josh Wright]

Those are awesome trail cam pics. Some of the best I've seen.

 

[weaver]

Awesome pics! Thanks for sharing

 

[Becca]

Awesome Shane! How did you manage to pick such a good spot? Was there a lot of hair and tracks in the area, or was it just luck? Thanks again for posting, your pictures are great!

 

[Mike7]

Those are amazing, thanks. Ya, how did you pick the spot, and also what trail camera did you use?

 

[shanevg]

It's a spot that I've always known the mountain goats wintered in but it took me a long time to figure out a route through the cliffs to get the camera placed on top of the cliffs. It may not come as a surprise to a lot of you that I love watching mountain goats so I just knew I had to find a way to get a camera in there

I use a SpyPoint camera I got on clearance from Camofire. I have no idea what model it is. It runs in 6 C batteries and the best part about the camera is the battery life, especially considering the difficulty of accessing this spot. I put new batteries in the camera when I placed it in October and it still read full charge when I checked it this weekend!

 

[Matt Cashell]

Keep 'em coming Shane! That looks like a really nice billy in the first pic.

Can you check what model SpyPoint that is sometime for us? great pics.

 

[Matt Cashell]

Does it look like this?

http://www.amazon.com/Spypoint-Infrared-Digital-Surveilance-IR-5/dp/B004LSKMW8

 

[shanevg]

That's the one Bitterroot. I've been extremely happy with it! Takes great videos too.

 

[shanevg]

And yes that's a really nice billy. I have measured a billy taken out I this herd 20 years ago or so that is 12.25" and this billy looks very similar in length. Not quite the same mass as that billy but that one scored over 55" so I would guess this billy is easily 50+.

 

[Bighorse]

Right on! Those are sweet shots. I've hunted a shoulder adjacent to some cliffs here in SE Alaska durring the winter that looks like that. There are goat beds scattered around there with piles of poo. That Billy is magnificent.

 

[Soutie]

Bitterroot..make sure it's the same before you order it. The camera in your link takes 6 AA batteries according to the specs/comments at the bottom and shane said that his take's size C. Not sure if this may make a difference in battery life on the trail. May influence how long you want to leave it out there.

 

[Matt Cashell]

Thanks Soutie, I will look for a C battery model. Nice catch.