Looking at doing some hog hunting at a relatives down south with a feeder and thinking of making a NV scanner with a small video screen.   We'll be hunting a feeder and I don't know the distance but was thinking it might be nice to have a NV monocular mounted to a tripod pointed at the feeder with a small video screen to display instead of just staring through the scopes all night.

I've got a couple first gen bushnell Equinox NV monoculars in 3 and 6 power with tv outputs.  So I'm looking for a small battery powered video monitor I could hook into it with an rca video connection.

I've seen similar setups with thermals on quads and side by sides on various youtube hunting channels.   Do they make anything powered from the standard usb connections like all the night vision devices?

Something like this.
12VDC

Have you thought about using an IR security camera?  It would be a hell of a lot cheaper and easier.  As an example, an Argus battery powered camera from Reolink.  I bought one with a solar panel for my wife to look at her bird feeders.  You could watch it on your phone.

I've already got the cameras.  Got them at the outlet store for less than $100.  They have a tv out and can be powered off a power bank. I've used them at night out to 300 yards.


A motion light mounted to the feeder would probably do the same thing.  I've also got a wireless solar driveway alarm that maybe useful depending on how far the feeder is from the house.  

I don't know how much waiting will be involved and how far we can stand off.  Just don't want to spend all night holding a monocular to my eye.

The one I mentioned is completely wireless.  You could mount it right next to the feeder and connect to it from a distance with your phone.

In my opinion the best tool for trying to catch hogs (since their timing is often random) is to get a cellular game camera and set the notifications on your phone to alert you when a new pic is taken.  Most of the ones actually allow you to set the notifications to only alert you when it senses a hog (not deer etc)...so basically no false alarms.  This has dramatically changed how my buddies and I hunt.  No more long nights sitting in cold or hot blinds waiting for hogs to show up (or not show up).  We sit at camp and have dinner or watch TV and when the cam goes off we head out to whatever feeder the pic was taken at and get on the pigs.  Cellular game cams are <$100 and usually have plans that are less than $15/mo...and you can pause the data plan when you aren't using them (say you won't be hunting for a few months etc.) or retask them for extra security around the house when not hunting.

I like that idea and right now I have an extra sim card.  Do you just set up the app and plug a sim card in it?  Never messed with the cell cams.

The ones I am familiar with do not allow for insertion of your own sim card.  In fact, the newer models (from companies like Moultrie and SpyPoint) are setup to allow them to communicate on whichever cell service is stronger in the area (whether that is Verizon or AT&T etc) which is nice because some of the areas we hunt only get a good signal from one provider and not the other...so moving cameras around is much simpler when the cameras can talk to any network.

Setup is easy and you just pay a small monthly fee during the times when you want to be using the camera.  

And you don't have to worry about matching the game camera's service provider to your mobile phone company's network.  They are totally independent.  About as easy as it can be!  

I have the Moultrie Edge camera and so far I like it a lot.  I also have one of their older models (can't recall the name)...and my buddy uses Spypoint cams.

I’ve got two SPYPOINT cameras and one quit after a year. SPYPOINT customer service sucks compared to Moultrie.

Anyone mess with the Bushnell cell cams?   I plan on doing something like this in addition to the scanner setup.  

I have a solar 100yard motion sensor we'll take and see if there's use for.  I've used it for deer in my yard.


While I was researching monitors yesterday, one of the two $90 ones dropped to $60 and I snagged it.   It powers off of 12vdc or a 911 camera battery and plugs directly into the av out of the monocular.  Found some 8400mah batteries that have usb out so it can power the screen and be backup power for the monocular.  Also picked up a couple $11 camera/monitor clamp mounts.  This lets me mount the monitor to a tripod leg or atv.  At some point we'll swap out the NV for a thermal for a mobile field scanner.

We had to move up our trip to 2 weeks from now.  It's our first hog hunt and first time at this relatives property.  We'll see how it goes.

I only have personal experience with Moultrie cell cams.  I have a couple of buddies that use Spypoint and while they seem to work good most of the time I will confirm what sparkyD said up above...Spypoint's customer service is a pain if you do have to use them.

Also, I should have asked this above...you talked about setting up some NV scanners using monoculars, but how are you planning to actually target/shoot the hogs once you get on them?  NV scopes, thermal, etc?

We picked up a couple one leaf commander clip on nightvision monoculars.

Cool, have fun...hope you bag some hogs!

Ended up having to delay the trip due to health issues.

Was putting together the pieces and realized that my tripod is tiny but got everything working and tested.   Heading down next week.

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Hunting this weekend.  First sit to test the nightvision.  Concept worked well.  Didnt get to use it at night since the hogs came out 5 minutes before dark. Had four come out and things happened fast and then we didnt know how many had holes in them. Ended up tracking down 2.   The big one apparently got all the hate it had 4 holes in it.  556 77grn at 40yrds is nasty and hogs are tough.  The meat looks amazing.

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The next night we were out for a few hours after dark and ran the screen setup. It worked well but our setup was too tight for the 3.5x of the monocular.   We were at 35 yards and the flare from the ir light was pretty bad and the field of view was around 12'.  The image looked much better past 60 yards.  

Didnt have any pigs come in that night but caught a deer and a rabbit walking past.

Setup
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Processing
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Been eating the free range forest pork and decided that we better go get more before it gets too hot and the ticks and vegetation comes out.  Got parts coming for mobile night vision scanner V2 (aka Revenge of the Poors).  

Have a infiray T2 Pro thermal camera for android coming.  The plan is to reuse the mount and clamp it to my trigger sticks for a more portable scanner.  Possibly do some night stalking.

Upsides-
Thermal
Sensor Resolution
Screen Resolution.  Phone
Wider field of view
More energy efficient.
Less accessories needed.  Batteries, cables, monitor.
Smaller compact package.
Lighter
Better Screen Brightness control.  The previous monitor was very bright.

Downsides.
Can't replace batteries on the fly.  Will have to rotate a couple cell phones.  Don't know what the runtime will be.
About twice the cost.

Looks like the pork was willing to cooperate. Congrats on the good eats.

These alarms work really well. You can turn the sound off and just have a red light if you want to.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08HZ6P3S1?tag=arfcom00-20

I've got something very similar that I may set up this trip. Found out on the last trip that the feeder isn't visible from the house but may set it up and stalk out there.

Been playing with the T2 Pro to get used to it before we go back down in a couple days.  It's way cooler than I expected for the cost.   It's still a 2x magnification but field of view is atleast twice of what the other was.  Clarity is awesome for only 256 resolution.  Battery life seems exceptional.   Ran it for an hour and it used 13% of the phone battery.  I could make out people 200 yards away through trees.

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Took v2 ROP out this weekend for some hogs.  Didnt see any but got a good test run of the system.

The good.
Thermal is awesome.
This camera bats well above its price tag in clarity.
Battery life was fantastic.  Used 50% of an old S10s battery in 3 hours of constant use.
Its light and easy to deploy. I used a camera mount to my trigger sticks. Worked well scanning to the sides.
Was able to identify many different animals at what I thought to be un realistic distances. Caught many animals moving through the weeds. Caught a deers head moving just above a hill at around 400y.
Great pictures.
The ability to dim the phone screen all the way and switch to a color palette with less light colors really cuts down on the light in the blind.
It has a compass built in to the screen.  You dont know how awesome a compass is until it gets pitch black and nothing looks the same.

The bad.
Taking video. Every time I hit the video button I get a message and the app reboots but doesnt take video.  Probably user error in the phone setup.  Will have to work on this.
I would still like more viewing angle but that's probably more resolution and money. Or less zoom. The 2x of this unit had twice as much as the old 3x ir monocular.

Pictures.
Coyotes at somewhere around 200yrds.  Closer trees on the right are 200+ yards. Far trees are 425.
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Bunnies around 100
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Raccoon eating my hog bait. He was there for a hour and a half.   I hope he gets diabetes.
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With temp measurements. This is cool because the crosshairs track the hottest thing on the screen as it moves.
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