Camera Trapping in the Classroom

I will invite Christian speak of more on this topic as he is the one actually in the classroom, but I wanted to point to a research project by a high school student in New York that used camera traps to ask whether prey items may be luring fishers to more urban environments.  Follow the link for still shots and video from a Reconyx trap.

We found higher diversity and overall higher activity of animals in our camera traps set in urban forests than in those out in the wild areas. The objective of this study was to compare the potential prey communities that fishers might encounter in these two environments. Could fishers be lured into these areas by abundant prey? Now we know that, yes, this could be part of the explanation (i.e. hypothesis not rejected).

As someone who spends many more hours indoors than I do outdoors, I cannot say I disagree with Joseph's take on camera-trapping:

I love camera traps because they are easy to use, and it is fun to look at the results. Lock a camera to a tree, write down the GPS coordinates, and walk away for a few weeks.

Come back and you get to look at new clips of animals running around. It is rare to take a walk in the woods and actually see a mammal like a fox, but put a camera trap out and you’ll get them

When is our NY Times expose?

h/t JR