15 Personal Safety tips from CIA!

Over the last few weeks we’ve had to give advise to a few friends after their place was burgled. So after looking into questions of personal and home safety, we arrived at these tips for you to put into practice. If applied, these will give you and your household greater protection.

1. This might seem obvious, but you’ll be surprised how many suburban homes are unlocked somewhere. So make sure all doors and windows have locks/deadlocks, USE THEM!

2.  When you arrive home have your key handy so you are not standing there fumbling around making yourself an easy target.

3.  Keep doors locked even when you or family members are at home.

4. Have locks installed on your fuse boxes and external power sources. 

5.  If you arrive by car at night always leave your headlights on until you have opened the front door or garage.

6. Have motion lights fitted or leave on an outside light at night. 

7.  Make sure you know who is at the front door before opening it.  Have a door viewer fitted so you can clearly see them and they can’t see you. The old chain-lock you find in cheap hotels, DO NOT offer protection.

8.  When you first purchase your house or apartment get the locks and keys changed. 

9.  Be aware of unknown visitors at your door asking to use the phone or some other item. Ask them to wait in a well lit area away from your door and make the phone call for them without letting them in (you will know whether to call their number or the Police based on how they respond).

10.   When someone phones with a wrong number never give them your correct number.  Should you receive an obscene phone call, hang up and call the police.

11.  Try to remain anonymous by:

·    Not using your full name on Facebook and other online social sites.

·    Not using your photo for a profile and have your security settings set high so only your friends can see your photos.

·   Do not use you name or initials as a customized vehicle number plate, in fact keep the standard number plate, they’re harder to remember and that’s a good thing.

·   Get rid of those ridiculous “My Family” stickers. (Why tell the stalker you have more than one daughter?)

12.  Think about putting in a monitored alarm system.

13.   Have security cameras fitted with a recorder so that if you are burgled/robbed there is a record for the police.  It is important to have a dated and timed recording.

14.  When you arrive home if you are suspicious that someone is inside your house go immediately to the local Police or another secure place (relatives, friends or known neighbor’s house).

15.   If you are still concerned for your safety, try the GSM watch with available from Cams in Action, which will dial your emergency or next of kin contact at the press of one button and send an SMS to that number with your GPS coordinates! Pretty cool gadget really!

Well hopefully these points will help you solve some of your safety concerns. Remember the list of tips does not stop here or guarantee total protection. When thinking of possible personal safety scenarios, we always came back to the term ‘situational awareness’. If you will let your guard down in the safety of your home, make sure you have systems in place to make your home “safe”. If you have specific concerns or if you have experienced threats, contact the Police straight away.

Protecting the wild with Trail Cameras

It’s a wonder to see animals roaming around in their natural habitat. It can also be quite difficult and for a good reason. If you walk through the country side or your local nature reserve, oftentimes you may not come across any wildlife at all. But that does not mean it’s not there!

Animals have very quickly learned that in general, humans are a threat. Whether it is to their safety through hunting or trapping or their habitat through re-zoning and destruction of natural land reserves. Speak to wildlife workers in Africa, Canada or the US and you will learn that even certain apex predators (top of the food chain) will be intelligent enough and opt to stay well away from sounds and smells of ‘people’.

So how do scientists and animal trackers find and follow the specific animal they are searching for? Well there are of course conventional methods like searching for tracks. Depending on what it is, the animal may have also been previously tagged. But the big issue lies in the fact that many animals move around at night, simply because it is either safer or more comfortable given the local climate. Now you may choose to spend your Saturday night sitting in the bush with a Nightvision to spot your wildlife. But in reality unless you are a pro, the animals will hear you and smell you long before you know they are there.

The best option to track night-time movements, is to locate the nearest animal trail, or water source and set up a ‘Trail Camera’. Then you simply return the next day or even a few days later and review the footage.

The beauty of these cameras is that even if the animal you are tracking works out that the camera is there, quite often it becomes curious. From Trail Camera footage that we have reviewed so far it’s fascinating to see how many walk up for a ‘sniff’. You might even spot something you never expected to see!

How Trail Cameras can offer Information and Protection 

Monitoring animal movements and migration plays a key role in preservation of endangered species and on the other end of the scale can help farmers monitor and protect their livestock and property from unwanted visitors (both wildlife and human).

In Australia, introduced species like Foxes, Pigs, Rabbits and Wild dogs are a threat, not just to crop and livestock, but to property as well. This is why farmers and people who live in areas near wildlife reserves need to build sturdy fences to keep these pests away. On occasion, these animals (including Kangaroos) will find a way to break through the fences and wreak havoc inside the paddocks and properties. To tackle this issue, the farmer simply needs to consider the use of a Trail Camera much in the same way as a security surveillance camera. Attach it to the fence post, gate-post or in a tree, really it’s up to your imagination. You can then very effectively identify exactly which critter (or person) is causing the problem.

The camera needs to be weather proof and must be activated automatically, through motion or sound detection. Trail Cameras were developed with this in mind, they can withstand a variety of different weather conditions and are equipped with night vision. At Cams in Action we have Trail Cameras like the Ibex Trail Camera or the MINOX Trail Camera DTC 500 provide you with high-resolution video and still photographs of your surroundings.

Example of Trail Camera use

The first example that comes to mind is species translocation through animal bridges or tunnels. This image is a wildlife bridge located in the Netherlands.

Animal bridges and tunnels are designed to help animals cross highways in safety and have also been effectively employed in Canada and the US. 

Through the use of Trail Cameras animal populations have been observed to dramatically increase and become (genetically) much healthier, because the bridges and tunnels don't just protect wildlife from being hit by cars, they also connect fragmented habitats and help populations intermingle and breed, or in other words to improve their genetic heterogeneity. With a little help from Trail Cams ;)