You hopefully still remember my blogpost about the smart AI recognition bird feeder. In the meantime, this smart bird feeder is no longer on my Berlin balcony but at my parents´ home in a more rural environment. That was a wise decision because there is a nice variety of birds to watch.

However, I did not want to do without such a smart bird feeder on my balcony anymore.

Buying a new one was out of the question for cost reasons, so I decided to build a cheaper alternative myself. Read this blogpost to find out how well I succeeded.

Finding components to build a DIY bird feeder camera

What does it take to get a feeder with a camera, similar to the Smart AI Bird Feeder?
Thanks to the products available nowadays on Amazon and Aliexpress, among others, providing all the necessary components is basically quite simple.

Let's start with the feed house. This must be well suited for the placement of a camera. If you already have a suitable camera, you can look for a suitable feeder according to the size and mounting options of this camera. I found what I was looking for on Amazon and chose this feed house.

This feeder conveniently has a large round hole in the back wall. Through this hole, a camera could be placed close to the feeder.

The next step was to find a suitable camera. Like the camera of the Smart AI Bird Feeder, it should have the following properties:

• weather resistance
• night vision function
• Very important: motion detection
• Storage option on SD card
• Also very important: Self-sufficient power supply by solar cell

After several failed purchases of various wifi connected cameras from Amazon, I finally found this solar cell camera on Aliexpress:

It quickly turned out that this camera has all the features to be a good alternative to the Smart AI Bird Feeder.

Here you can see the final result of my DIY assembly. You already know the wooden construction from my blogpost for the Smart AI Bird Feeder:

Conclusion

In fact, my DIY smart bird feeder with camera can be considered a high-tech camera-equipped bird feeder that allows you to observe and capture the activities of your feathered friends. Just like the SMART AI Bird Feeder, it enhances your bird-watching experience by combining technology and natural beauty.

The camera captures high-quality images and videos of birds that visit the feeder, which can be viewed remotely on a mobile app. You can even set up notifications to alert you when new birds visit the feeder.

Infact, the camera-proprietary app ICSee has definitely proven itself so far. I am absolutely satisfied with the build quality for my purposes. The fact that only pigeons appear on my balcony is certainly not the fault of the camera.

Motion detection works without any problems. Not only the camera resolution is also impressive, but also the durability of the battery thanks to the accompanying solar cell. 

Overall, my DIY smart bird feeder with camera is an excellent alternative to observe the birds on my balcony, while also providing them with a reliable source of food. With all expenses factored in, the savings over the Smart AI Bird Feeder is about $90.