You’re on Candid Camera

A very familiar sight for me this time of the year, is something that looks a lot like what is pictured in this tree above.  I live in a house with hunters, and this is a plot watcher, or a hidden camera for wildlife.  I know all about these things.  What I didn’t expect was to find not one, but two attached to a couple of trees while out taking blog pictures, OF MYSELF, one morning.

I am the one that will be appearing on candid camera, I am afraid.  You see, I recently found a new favorite spot for taking blog photos, it is in the state park, a few turns off of the main road, on the way to a picnic shelter.  There is never anyone around and it is not a problem to just park on the road and set up the tripod.  Nobody has ever driven by and the boy is quite content knowing he won’t be embarrassed by anyone who might see him with me, his crazy mommy who occasionally takes pictures of herself, for her blog.

This week, I drove just a little further down the road to the parking area where there was an old wooden fence I thought I could use for a backdrop.  As I was tromping through the leaves, tripod in hand, looking for the perfect place to set up and shoot, I glanced at a nearby tree, and saw the strangest looking camo colored bird house with a lock on it.  That is weird I thought, then yelled after the boy to hurry up and bring the camera when I realized that this was no bird house, it was in fact a deer camera, and it had been capturing my whole self-photo, scouting session!  Immediately, I packed up my stuff, and headed back to the car, laughing the whole way.  Everything had been, and even still was, being recorded.  I thought I had parked out of range, but turns out, as I was stopping to take a very sneaky side view picture of this camera, for the blog, I noticed another one on a different tree right in front of me, ugh!  Who knows how many there were and how long they have been set up.  The state park just may have all of  my outtake photos for the last several months!  OH. NO! 

I drive through this park a lot, and have a pretty distinctive car that is very occasionally parked on side roads and trails to take photos, mostly of myself, and now I am trying to remember if any of the Rangers seemed to be pointing and laughing when they have driven passed me.  All of this time I thought they were just raising their hands up to give me a friendly hello, but now, I am not so sure…

Instead of looking for the perfect photo location, I am on the lookout for hidden cameras in the park.  I also have my eye on those Rangers; I hope they really aren’t pointing and laughing.