Happy birds

By Andrew Gregory. Posted

This article was originally published as part of HackSpace magazine, which has since been incorporated into Raspberry Pi Official Magazine.

Happy birds

There’s a lot to take in with this build, so we’ll go slowly. It’s 3D-printed. It’s solar-powered. It’s connected to the Internet of Things. It takes photographs of birds when they land on the bird feeder, and then sends those photographs to your smartphone via a free app. Most of all, it looks great: it’s not a proof of concept or a slightly wobbly prototype.

Screenshot 2022-02-25 at 11.38.08

The two solar panels on the roof charge a 4800mAh Li-ion battery, which powers an ESP32-CAM board. This sleeps in low-power mode until a PIR sensor detects a bird, whereupon it wakes up and takes a picture.


Andrew Gregory

Features Editor Andrew trawls the internet for Cool Stuff while keeping the magazine running smoothly.

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