How it's all put together.
People ask what the cameras are and how the box is mounted, so here it is in full — including the parts that took two attempts.
Cameras
Four Reolink cameras, all wired rather than wireless. Power over Ethernet means one cable per camera carrying both power and video, which removes any battery anxiety on a stream that runs twelve hours a day.
Three are outdoor units covering the nest box exterior, the feeders, and the bath. The fourth is a small dome mounted inside the roof of the nest box, looking straight down at the floor with infrared for night.
Everything runs back to a network video recorder in the garage, and from there into OBS on a dedicated Windows machine that handles the encoding and the switching between cameras.
The nest box
Cedar, unpainted, with a 1.5-inch entrance hole — the right size for Eastern Bluebirds and Tree Swallows, too small for starlings. No perch below the hole, which bluebirds don't need and House Sparrows appreciate far too much.
Mounted at about five feet on a smooth steel pole with a cone baffle beneath it. The entrance faces east so it catches morning sun.
The first position was eight feet from a large maple. A squirrel can clear that from a standing branch, so the pole came out and went back in further into the open.
Feeders
Two pavilion-style hopper feeders on a double shepherd's hook, with a single torpedo baffle on the main pole below the fork — one baffle protects both.
Black oil sunflower in one. Mealworms in the other, which is the single most effective way to interest a bluebird in a nearby box.
They sit about ten feet from a shrub line. That distance matters more than most people expect: a feeder marooned in open lawn gives birds no escape route and they simply won't use it.
The bird bath
A shallow copper basin on a stake, with a floating solar fountain. Depth is under two inches, and flat river stones on the bottom give birds secure footing — smooth metal feels unstable underfoot and they'll avoid it.
Moving water is the strongest attractant in the yard. Birds locate it by sound from a surprising distance.
Storage and seed
Sunflower seed lives in a galvanised metal can with a locking lid. Rodents chew through plastic and bags without much trouble. Live mealworms go in the refrigerator; dried ones in a sealed metal tin, kept dry.
What we'd do differently
- Site the nest box further from the tree line from the start.
- Buy a PoE switch with a larger power budget. An eight-port switch rated at 62 watts total runs out before four 4K cameras are satisfied.
- Set a fixed IP reservation for the recorder on day one. A changed address silently breaks every camera feed at once.