The Agave Hill Camera Project

CAMERAS: Agave Hill Camera | Coyote Pond | Fish Cam

Location:
On Cliff overlooking the Deep Canyon Drainage

Click on any image to enlarge view.


Live View
Actively control the camera’s pan zoom and tilt settings over the web.

 


Agave Hill Camera
Overlooking Boyd Center Below.
The Agave Hill camera site is located on a promontory overlooking the Deep Canyon gorgeand floodplain. The site is remote, difficult to access, subject to extreme desert conditions, and heavy wind loads. We chose this site to test the limits of off-the-shelf components deployed in the real world. Our goal is to create a reliable imaging system for use in research, teaching, and management.The Agave Hill camera is a wireless, solar powered system with connectivity to the Boyd Center local area network and the internet. The camera has pan, tilt, and zoom capabilities that can be controlled by any user with an internet connection. We will also create a database for repeat imagery of fixed locations to document seasonal and long-term habitat changes. Opportunistic images can include raptor nesting locations and bighorn sheep activity.Remote surveillance allows researchers to observe animal behavior without the disturbance of a human presence that can alter the normal behavior of an animal. Another benefit of remote sensing is that it reduces impacts to soils and vegetation that result from frequent visits to an area.

The mission of the University of California includes education and public outreach. Remote sensing facilitates educational opportunities and provides virtual access to sensitive areas that are otherwise closed to the public.


Agave Hill Deployment

We installed a Cannon pan and tilt camera at a location that will give the user the ability to analyze the habitat as well as the wildlife that frequently visit this area. This camera can be controlled by any user with an internet connection. The user has complete pan tilt and zooming control of the camera, which returns a live streaming image to the user’s computer. Remote observation of wildlife and vegetation allows researchers to study the areas without the disturbance that human presence typically causes. It also allows us to minimize our impact on the soil and vegetation in the area. Another beneficial aspect is the time and cost to the researcher that is saved by reducing the need for frequent visits to remote locations that can now be reached through a computer monitor. These camera deployments allow us to provide this information to a much wider audience of researchers, including grade school and high school students.