hiflier Posted January 7 Author Share Posted January 7 3 minutes ago, norseman said: Here is my take. Because the detail in the object some what matches its surroundings? When I just looked at the snippet it made no sense. But viewing it in its original trail cam photo I think it’s a beam of light hitting that tree and foliage. It’s somewhat oblong, and is brighter than its surroundings. Some one off camera to the right is shining a light and hitting the foliage in the far left of the frame. The second object doesn’t look like eyes to me. Dunno. And you may be right about that, norseman. One might think that such a long bright beam would illuminate a larger and perhaps deeper area and not be so relatively narrow? Or that coming from the right as you say would illuminate more of the tree trunks to the center of the photo. Certainly possible though and I'm open to all viewpoints, it's why I decided to bring this here. I'm also not aware that a game cam, being infrared sensitive at night, could pick up a light beam which basically carries no heat. Eyeshine does get recorded from a tapeta lucidum, of course, which is a reflective eye membrane so it bounces back light when animals unknowingly step into their moments of fame. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
norseman Posted January 7 Share Posted January 7 In this photo I can see the trunk of the tree in the object. You can just follow it right up the tree. And I think the rest is just foliage being lit up. Some flashlights have a very narrow beam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 7 Author Share Posted January 7 (edited) I can understand that. Okay, so someone came in at two in the morning into private woods and shined a light. Moonset was about midnight, so rule out moonlight coming through the trees from the southwest. Just saying that leaves either artificial light or something the cam's flash caught. My first thought was maybe a poacher. My next thought with all the ferns was someone collecting fiddleheads but as one can see it's way past fiddlehead season. The cam's location was about 150 yards from the north side of a dirt road with the cam itself facing away from the road and roughly northeast so that sunlight wouldn't hit the lens in the daytime. Edited January 7 by hiflier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WanderingLorax Posted January 7 Share Posted January 7 I never knew people harvested the heads of ferns until your post hilier. Let alone knew that there was a season. Is there a reason to harvest these at night? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Incorrigible1 Posted January 7 Share Posted January 7 7 minutes ago, WanderingLorax said: Is there a reason to harvest these at night? To better evade the bigfoot, natch! ::kidding:: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 7 Author Share Posted January 7 (edited) 30 minutes ago, WanderingLorax said: I never knew people harvested the heads of ferns until your post hilier. Let alone knew that there was a season. Is there a reason to harvest these at night? Only if the harvester wants to sneak onto some else's property uninvited in order to get some. And as you can see there was quite a crop in the spring just in the area within the photo. It's actually a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of brackens growing on the property. The property owner allows harvesting in small amounts to neighbors but had to forbid one harvester from going onto the property because even though the harvester swore he wasn't selling the fiddleheads he was, in fact, caught red-handed selling them in quantity. P.S. Fiddleheads are delicious when young and sauteed in butter. Later they become poisonous so get 'em early or not at all. An anecdote I had read about 40 years ago in a book on black magic. If one harvested the single purple flower from a bracken fern at midnight on midsummer's night they were given the gift of invisibility. The irony of that? Brackens don't flower Edited January 7 by hiflier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WanderingLorax Posted January 7 Share Posted January 7 14 minutes ago, Incorrigible1 said: To better evade the bigfoot, natch! ::kidding:: Or perhaps Bigfoot is showing them the best areas to harvest! 😆 5 minutes ago, hiflier said: Only if the harvester wants to sneak onto some else's property where they grow in order to get some. And as you can see there was quite a crop in the spring just in the area within the photo. It's actually a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of brackens growing on the property. The property owner allows harvesting in small amounts but had to forbid one harvester from going onto the property because even though the harvester swore he wasn't selling the fiddleheads he was, in fact, caught red-handed selling them. Thank you for enlightening me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 7 Author Share Posted January 7 5 minutes ago, WanderingLorax said: Thank you for enlightening me You're welcome, added an edit with some info. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 7 Author Share Posted January 7 (edited) 5 hours ago, norseman said: The second object doesn’t look like eyes to me. Dunno. Yeah, me either but it happened on different nights from two different spots and heights. Tried to look at it and then judge it compared to the daytime photo. Again, like you, dunno. Edited January 7 by hiflier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 8 Author Share Posted January 8 (edited) I have a question (of course ). Could illumination of objects in an image fool edge-detection software into creating a solid looking form that isn't solid? I really suck at image software but I had thought of having just a photo of the spruce either overlaid or added as an image layer and clone-stamping the light color of the object onto the spruce tree layer to try and get rid of the spruce tree, thinking it it might be in front of whatever is there- Or not there. Edited January 8 by hiflier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bipedalist Posted January 8 BFF Patron Share Posted January 8 6 hours ago, hiflier said: Coupla more details> I occasionally got eyeshine but I attributed it more to owls than anything else. I also added a daytime photo of the area: Two small white floaters with eyes in black and whites def prob northern flying squirrel, seems the tail didn't show but could have been windage away from cam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 8 Author Share Posted January 8 3 minutes ago, bipedalist said: Two small white floaters with eyes in black and whites def prob northern flying squirrel, seems the tail didn't show but could have been windage away from cam. I like that thanks, bipedalist. There are other examples that could very well fit that scenario. A friend who also had a cam up there did get a barred owl so I kinda defaulted to that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chim Chim Posted January 8 Share Posted January 8 Something’s there, hard to tell. You never know what’s walking around in the woods though, here’s an apparently unshorn sheep we caught on camera, I don’t know of anybody in the area with sheep and have no idea where it came from or went too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bipedalist Posted January 8 BFF Patron Share Posted January 8 20 minutes ago, hiflier said: I like that thanks, bipedalist. There are other examples that could very well fit that scenario. A friend who also had a cam up there did get a barred owl so I kinda defaulted to that. Size would be more consistent with screech or saw-whet owl though unless you have size references I'm not seeing. Bats can make and obvious flapping wings profile so not that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hiflier Posted January 8 Author Share Posted January 8 (edited) 31 minutes ago, bipedalist said: Size would be more consistent with screech or saw-whet owl though unless you have size references I'm not seeing. I don't. I was going on the size objects as being eyeshine, not light reflection off small bodies in flight. Too hard for me to tell at such a distance anyway so basically had to let things since the reflections are so indistinct. I just know there was at least one owl in the area for a while so pickin's among the ferns may have been good enough to keep it around. And of course the ubiquitous turkeys and deer were there along with an occasional fawn early on. Hawks, Crows,, maybe a vulture or two. It's an interesting area. Edited January 8 by hiflier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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