I just picked up one of the new Bushnell trophy cam HD wireless units and it's working pretty darn good so far. I had been thinking about a wireless/cellular trail cam for a while but the monthly subscription and adding a line to my cell phone plan was looking like $40-60/month year round when I only wanted it for the fall/winter/spring. This one worked for me because the sim card is in the camera so you dont have to add a line to your phone plan and the plan is $9.99/month for 1,000 images through bushnell. The images are small but you can download larger ones for $1 each(not planning on that) or just pull the full size off the card later on. The camera is pricey at $599 but I think worth it in the long run.

I looked long and hard at those. Went with the new covert 3G instead due to the smaller pics that get sent. I assume those pics are straight from what it sends to your phone. If that's the case, they aren't too bad.

I was lucky and adding a line (unlimited call/text) to my ATT was only an additional 10/month. So I get unlimited text for 10 bucks extra, and not limited to the 1000/month like bushnells plan, and judging on the activity level I think I would either turn down the settings or go over 2000 pics in a month come cooler weather, as I am darn close to that now in the summer months. Wake up every morning with about 50 pics form the night before and get some in dawn dusk time too.

I like Bushnell cams, would love to hear a follow up report as you use it more, there just aren't that many reviews out there for this camera.

Cool I think DNS has had good luck with that setup too. I don't have the unlimited data, and I didn't want the images texted to me or emailed to me. The Bushnell has an iphone app you can check whenever you like and just sends push notifications if new pics are available.
What size pics get sent through the covert?
Can you put multiple covert cams on the same plan? At $10/month unlimited pics that would be a steal.

With my current ATT plan, I think they call it the family share plan, you can add up to 10 lines all with unlimited calling and texting and share a set amount of data per month. I have three kids and my wife and I and we share 20GB of data, way too much, but it gives us a lot of overage room. We usually use around 11-12GB of data (dang group texts and instagram/vine the kids use)...anyway, I can add another 3 coverts or other lines to my service all for an extra 10/month. Haven't gone there yet, as my wife would kill me, but it is a possibility.

The pics it sends are decent. Not great, but they are typical cell phone text pictures. Enough to see the details. I couldn't tell you the exact size they are sent as, but it seems to me the size of 60kb seems like a setting I clicked on at some point. May be wrong there.

A couple things I liked about the bushnell cam were the lack of jacking with a sim card and having the plan run through an app...pretty cool.

What kind of battery life are you seeing out of it, or is it too early to tell. My regular Bushnells get about 6-9 months on about 2000 pics a month. Pretty darn good. My covert I am setting up with a solar panel.

Picture size on the emailed/texted Coverts? Here ...






These are pretty low res images, only about 40-80k in size (depending on night or day), but they are usually enough to see what you need. You just can't blow them up too much.

Those pics look much better than mine. I thought I had discovered something, but you two are already on top of it!
I wonder why the covert cams get bad reviews online? Think it's user error or spotty service?

I have HCO's. $10.00 a month to add a line to AT&T. Doesn't use any data, just uses your unlimited texting plan.

He's back

I don't know if it's your intention to market the bushnells but the coverts will move a lot better and you don't have to deal with the warranty work. I have seen very little bad press on the covert black ops and personally own 3 of them which have worked flawlessly for the past 2 years.

No I don't sell these things just a camera I picked up for fun. The difference in the Covert and the Bushnell is the app and data usage. If the covert works for you more power to you that's great. I didn't see an option on the covert to not get emails or texts? Maybe it's there and I just missed it. To me it's annoying to get 50 text messages or emails in the middle of the night. I would much rather just check the iphone/android app when I feel like it. The black ops looks nice and is a couple hundred bucks cheaper so that's good. Just doesn't have the app which is a deal breaker for me.

No, it is not there on the Coverts. They don't have a separate service for the images to go elsewhere. However, you could just set up a separate email and then just check that like you would check the Bushnell site and that way not have it blow up your phone like mine sometimes does with the Covert (which I actually enjoy, but am not running a business from my phone).

The important thing is that folks find what works for them regardless of the platform. Either way, it is cool to be able to know remotely about things going on where you hunt. It has been a key factor in several of my hunts where I have specifically gone to where the camera is because I knew it to have hogs. You can do that with either type of platform.

so do you get the texts as soon as pics are taken? explain how it works

Ordered a Covert Black Ops 3G yesterday. Waiting for it to ship.

Yeah that is a good idea, plus you get unlimited pics. Combine that with Bushnell's less than great service reputation. Now I am feeling the buyer's remorse coming on strong.

Here's one of the hi-res that you can download for $.67

The camera takes a picture and then uploads it to you (or as in this case, to Bushnell's site). Depending on various factors, the pics usually arrive within 1-3 minutes of when the picture was taken. Depending on where you are when the picture is taken and how your game is behaving, that information can be actionable. In my case, I have been up in Montague County twice when pics came in and drove to my property and successfully hunted pigs. Once I was hunting a different stand on the property, got pics, and headed over to where the hog was an took it. Seven or eight times I have tried to go from Denton to my property in Montague (about an hour away). Three or four times, I have managed to get a hog. Twice, I saw hogs, but didn't get a shot. The other times, the pigs were just gone. It is hard to drive the speed limit knowing you have hogs and that they are going going to stay as long as the corn.

Now, if only you could remotely set off your feeder to keep the game there longer. It would also be very cool to have the ability to Take a picture and upload on command.

With the covert you can text it a command to take a picture. There are times when I ask it to take a pic and to shows animals in the background outside the range of the detector, but still showing the animals are there. Have a feeling I will be using that this hunting season quite a bit.

I believe the bushnell can do that too??

Would be awesome to be able to set up a command driven system to spin the feeder at will, that way you can keep hogs there until you get there. I don't think any of the current cell cameras have that capability, but that means there is a potential market for an add-on...

Basically, you are talking about a wifi, blue tooth, or IR command to a receiver on the feeder, from the camera, to trigger the feeder?

Yes, do you know of a system like that?

Thanks guys for this topic. I'd love to view my pics without driving 2 hours to check my camera card. I'm definitely gonna study the wireless trail cam options.

I've been wanting the Bushnell , nice to finally see some pics and over view on one. May have a couple of them going by next summer.

Well, after a few months the Bushnell is still going strong so I ordered another. It has been very nice not having to check cameras.
The batteries have run down once so far and I am thinking I should add a solar panel setup to increase the battery life.