I bought the Anglo Arms Pop Up Hide from Ebay. It's less than £50. I'm using it mainly to take pictures. The additional camouflage netting was something I bought separately.
First impressions are that it's huge. 6 foot 3 apparently. It feels good quality though the zips (and there are many) don't look like they'd keep out much water. It's easy to pop up but not so easy to pop down. In fact, since popping up, it has stayed that way. There are two videos on Youtube showing how it's done but I still can't get it. I'll enlist help at some point from people more able than I.
I set it up on slabs so it was a bit wobbly but once I was inside it was ok. There's plenty of room inside. No floor though so you can't really leave things lying on the ground.
The viewing windows are nice and big bit only open from the top so leave you quite exposed once the flaps are down. You can open them one side at a time though so I might try that next time, though it might be a bit awkward getting the camera away to the edge of the hide. The extra netting I bought really came in handy. In fact I would suggest the hide would be useless without it.
I was using a bog standard camping seat and felt a little low compared to the windows. This meant I had to open the window fully to see out.
It certainly worked. I only added a few extra suet balls to the feeder to entice the birds in and in no time at all they were arriving in numbers. It was great to hear the new calls from the birds when they don't have to warn each other about me. They didn't seem to notice the camera either which was handy. I was able to snap away without them caring.
I have loads more photos but most of them are quite poor as I was more interested in testing their awareness than getting the best pics. I sat for about an hour before coming back in to avoid the rain.
Seems good. Once I work out how to fold it away I'll take it out somewhere and test it out properly. And I also need to clean out that bird feeder by the looks of things.
First impressions are that it's huge. 6 foot 3 apparently. It feels good quality though the zips (and there are many) don't look like they'd keep out much water. It's easy to pop up but not so easy to pop down. In fact, since popping up, it has stayed that way. There are two videos on Youtube showing how it's done but I still can't get it. I'll enlist help at some point from people more able than I.
I set it up on slabs so it was a bit wobbly but once I was inside it was ok. There's plenty of room inside. No floor though so you can't really leave things lying on the ground.
The viewing windows are nice and big bit only open from the top so leave you quite exposed once the flaps are down. You can open them one side at a time though so I might try that next time, though it might be a bit awkward getting the camera away to the edge of the hide. The extra netting I bought really came in handy. In fact I would suggest the hide would be useless without it.
I was using a bog standard camping seat and felt a little low compared to the windows. This meant I had to open the window fully to see out.
It certainly worked. I only added a few extra suet balls to the feeder to entice the birds in and in no time at all they were arriving in numbers. It was great to hear the new calls from the birds when they don't have to warn each other about me. They didn't seem to notice the camera either which was handy. I was able to snap away without them caring.
I have loads more photos but most of them are quite poor as I was more interested in testing their awareness than getting the best pics. I sat for about an hour before coming back in to avoid the rain.
Seems good. Once I work out how to fold it away I'll take it out somewhere and test it out properly. And I also need to clean out that bird feeder by the looks of things.
