Webmaster Bowhunting.Net
First, lets talk about what the Aim-It™ is and what it says it will do for you. The Bohning web site says, “The Bohning Aim-It™ is a fully adjustable camera mount for game cameras”. It is intended to adjust so you can get the perfect game camera angle — right, left, up or down — so your game camera will get you pictures of what is coming through your area!
If you’re scouting with game cameras you know there are issues. If the camera angle is too low, by just a small amount, you do not get a picture of the deer’s head — or the bucks’ racks.
Too high and too much sky is in your pictures and they are dark and have lousy detail. Or there are bright glare spots that ruin the detail of the pics. Or else you will be missing part of what you want to see.
Too far left or right and and you could miss the activity at a scrape or crossing. Or catch the deer when they are behind limbs or some partial obstruction.
These things happens a lot. And the list of things that ruin your pictures is a lot longer than the few I mentioned above.
So what’s the problem?
In the beginning, myself and everybody I knew, fastened their game gamera(s) on trees. We used bungee chords or tied the camera unit to the tree. One of the problems was that the woods has all sizes of trees, small, medium, large and huge. Generally the medium sized tree worked best; but all too often, none were where you wanted to take pictures. So you hang the camera on an available tree and hope you get the deer activity.
So, 95% of the time, after we bungeed or tied our cameras to a tree it was aimed too high, or low, or too much to the left or right. Generally we fixed that, in the field, by poking a stick between the camera and tree, either at the top, bottom, left or right to adjust and improve the camera angle.
Gradually, products entered the market that adjusted the camera angle. I honestly believe I’ve tried everything on the market and, to get right down to it, they are all in the “no good” to “crummy” range. Sorry, but that’s my opinion.
And then …
Last month I saw an Aim-It Trail Camera Mount made by Bohning Archery. WOW!!! I could not believe how perfect this product appeared to be. Adjustments for up, down, right or left. And a bolt to attach the unit to all cameras with a 1/4″-20 standard threaded port.
I got one of these Aim-It trail camera mount Bohning innovations, glanced at it’s workings, and took it to my closest food plot area and set it up. One word covers it.
Fantastic.
When I looked at my first batch of deer pictures I made a few slight adjustments to the Aim-It unit and zeroed in on the trail I wanted to scout.
The next morning I was lucky enough to take a picture of a doe walking by my Aim-It mounted with a SpyPoint trail camera.
For years I’ve used a stump when I don’t have a tree or fence post to put a trail camera on. I used the stump here. First I attached a SpyPoint Tiny-W trail camera to the Aim-It and strapped it to the stump (with the included, adjustable, strap).
It is hard to beat a product that does the job and is still simple and effective. The pic below is looking down on the Aim-It and SpyPoint. Just strap the Aim It tightly to the tree, or stump. Simple and effective … and fast too.
Then adjust the 3 points of rotation on the Aim-It. Then tighten them by hand. (No tools are needed.)
Here is a close up of the main adjustment for up and down. You position the height precisely with the two saw toothed parts and turn the thumb knob for a tight, firm fit. Now the camera is securely pointed exactly where you want it to be.
Since 1996, I’ve scouted with game cameras. Back then the pictures were on 35mm film rather than today’s SD Cards. So I’ve done this scouting with a camera thing for quite a while, and getting them pointed precisely where I wanted has always been a challenge, time after time.
But now, the Bohning Aim-It has arrived. It is the best trail camera mount there has ever been. And I say, hurray.
Links:
- Bohning Archery web site
- AIM-IT Trail Camera Mount
- SpyPoint Trail Cameras
- Tiny-W wireless trail camera
