The rut is on and the first hard freeze is right behind it. A few minutes with your cameras and the Command app now means you won’t miss the chasing action, or come back to a dead camera after the first cold snap.
1. Power Up Before the Freeze
Cold weather is hard on batteries. If you haven’t charged your rechargeable battery packs lately, top them off now so they don’t get zapped the first night it really drops below freezing.
The best fix for cold weather is a solar battery pack, with your camera’s internal battery as the backup. The solar pack keeps your camera running through short, cold days, and the internal battery picks up the slack when the sun doesn’t show.
Running a 3.0 camera with the new Black Edition internal battery pack? It recharges from solar too, so your backup stays topped off.
Save 20% on Stealth Cam batteries and solar panels with code RUT20 through November 10, 2026.
Shop batteries and solar panels
2. Dial In Your Settings for the Rut
Bucks are on their feet and moving fast. Shorten your PIR delay (the trigger interval) so your camera is ready again sooner and catches the buck trailing behind the doe. Burst mode gives you several shots per trigger, so you see the whole chase instead of one frame.
Keep battery life in mind. Shorter delays and burst modes mean more triggers, and that adds up fast on a busy spot like a feeder. If a camera isn’t on solar, go easy on the settings or add a panel.
3. Switch to Video
Video is the best way to run a scrape. You see the whole visit: the licking branch, the pawing, and the buck checking the wind. It’s just as useful on trails, because video shows you where deer come from and where they go next.
In video mode, the Command app sends you a 3-image GIF preview. If you like what you see, request the full HD video and it downloads right to your phone. On our 2.0 and 3.0 cameras, HD video requests are fast and reliable, so you can pull the clip you want when you want it.
One thing that’s easy to miss: to download the full video, the file has to still be on the camera’s SD card or internal memory. If you format or swap the card, those videos are gone. Pull the ones you want first.
4. Let the Command App Do the Sorting
During the rut your camera can fill up fast. Command helps you sort through it all.
- Deer Profile groups photos of the same buck, so you can follow one deer across all of your cameras.
- Buck Scoring (beta) gives you an estimated score for the bucks on your cameras.
- Sort by the whitetail buck tag to cut through does, fawns and raccoons and make sure you never miss a buck.
Pro tip: add a time-of-day filter on top of the buck tag. That shows you just the bucks moving in daylight, a great indicator that the rut is kicking in and it’s time to spend more hours in the stand.
Get Ready for Gun Season
Gun season is right around the corner. Get your cameras charged, set and sorted now, and you’ll go into opening day knowing what’s moving and when.