Can BI /DS/AI detect birds?

[ScottJohn]

Hi there,
Newbie from Finland,
I have not yet purchased anything so have a blank slate....However I have an unusual use case!
My pier and boat are being fouled by seagulls. I have a water spray and a small, but effective, homemade air dancer, but infra-red detection is ineffective. The bright sunshine glinting off the ripples triggers almost continuously and the body mass of the birds is too small to create an effective heat signature. So my question is "Can Blue Iris / Deep Stack / AI reliably detect Gull sized birds?" I know there are bird table camera systems for birdwatchers that can identify specific bird types and species from 50cm, but this is NOT my use case. I want to trigger the water spray and air dancer when a gull lands on my boat or pier from cameras 5-15 metres away (approx 15 to 50 feet) . Does anyone have any experience , advice or suggestions whether this is feasible with current BI/DS/AI development before I invest in a rather expensive winter project for next season?
Many thanks,
Scott

[Rickity]

I get pigeons come onto my gravel driveway every day to eat grit that always triggerd and said it was a bird or birds if there was more than one depending how sensitive it was set so had to put bird in the AI to cancel worked a treat..

[ScottJohn]

Many thanks for the prompt reply, Rickety.
Sounds like this could work!
As you seem to have a viable system and I have nothing at the moment could I ask what kind of setup you have ? I will need to upgrade my old desktop and select some cameras, plus lay POE cable across the garden to the pier so any advice on minimum PC requirements and camera selection would be most welcome.
Thanks again,
Scott

[Rickity]

Hi Scott, the pc I have has an intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700K CPU @ 4.00GHz 4.00 GHz, 32.0 GB, windows 10 profesional and a Western Digital Purple 2TB Surveillance 3.5 Inch SATA Hard Disk Drive. It runs one camera with hardly any cpu use.
The camera I have is a Foscam FI9928P ptz Wifi or wired, 1080P Full HD (1920x1080p) H.264 Compression and 60 Metres (196ft) night vision which I dont realy beleive this to be true but daytime even using the substream the qualiy is very good.
I power it with psu unit that came with the camera and use it with Ethernet.
I have only the one single camera I know a lot of people put Foscam down but I get a real good pictue with a zoom and night vision is ok. The only thing I do not like is you have to use an external microphone and the audio could be better, Operating Temperature is -20°C~60° (-4°F~140°F).
I cannot advise you as there is so many cameras out there and computers to pick from but I would just sugest get the best you can afford and read some of the posts on this forum. The software is excellent and getting better all the time.

[ScottJohn]

Many thanks for sharing Rickity!

This was very valuable. I had seen elsewhere a recommendation for an i7 6th generation as a minimum for processing so this is what I will aim for. I think I will try for Power over Ethernet so I only need one cable and will investigate the camera you recommend to see if it or a later version supports that. Having watched several "state of the art" videos on Youtube one can easily be seduced into 4K cameras, HD audio, colour night vision etc. It is good to see that it is not really necessary for my application. For example, I don't need sound...the racket these birds make doesn't need recording! Also night vision is irrelevant as this is for the critical summer months when they nest and fledge in "the Land of the Midnight Sun". With 20+ hours of daylight I want scare them off before they settle down to roost for the night. Also at 60 degrees North the winter can drop well below the -20 degree Centigrade camera limit but by that time the birds have long gone and my boat is sitting in its heated winter storage shed at +16 degrees C so no problem there... and it's good to hear the software works well and is continually improving.

Thanks again as you have shown that this may be a lot simpler and cheaper than i thought! It seems now the biggest issue will be cable routing out of the house and under the yard to the pier!

This was very much appreciated!

Scott

[Rickity]

Hi Scott, I guess its a long way but the best option is to run some subduct or some type of stiff plastic tubing and run the cable through that I have done a couple of long cat6 runs well under 100 meters which really is about the cat6 poe limit, you could use fibre but you would have to power the camera seperate and get a pair of Gigabit Single-Mode Media Converters from amazon and some single or dual core fibre optic cable. We used to install fibre optic cable spines, the lengths were often over 12k long using from a single fibre on raf bases in the uk, up to things like 276 fibre for a spine between telecom exchanges. We used to blow the cable through the previously installed subduct that we put in a heavy duty 25mm diameter plastic tubeing.
see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3A_zC4tTwk for an idea of fibre to ethernet and back for cctv.

This is an old video when I was able to work and my youngest son who is a fibre optic splicer [my boss]and the older one a co worker, I am on my camera phone operating the tornado we were blowing 276 fibre that day I'm on the camera and operating the tornado I think this was a 3k job
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQWiblxPlDA&t=8s
hopefully you will find a way to do it...
Ricky

[ScottJohn]

Many thanks Ricky!

Sorry for the delay in reply, Been offline for a week! The video links are really useful (how did we survive before Youtube?) as they illustrate so simply, clearly and accurately the process and technique. I think the distance is probably about 50-60 meters (150-200 ft) which should be within the limit of PoE. I would never have thought of fibre unless I had seen your videos, as I thought it too difficult and requiring professional expertise but it really could be a relatively simple DIY job.

I also never thought of the idea of blowing the cable through a standard water pipe. I have a garden irrigation system that runs down to the pier so I might be able to use that as it is 40mm, though I would need to borrow your tornado to do it! I don't suppose my little compressor would be enough... Still there may be a company hiring such equipment. I also see an alternative route under the decking and inside a plastic pipe across the surface of the bare granite bedrock where it could be concealed under gravel...

So thanks again Rick, with your videos you have once again stimulated a lot of ideas and options which wouldn't have occurred to me to consider.

Sincerely appreciated!

Scott

[Rickity]

if you are only going to use a shortish length you could blow some small rope or small cable using your little compresser and a plastic bat on the end that goes like a rocket on rope or cord then pull the cable in on the rope or cord..
Ricky

[ScottJohn]

Great tip Ricky!

Much appreciated!

Scott!