Automation to deal with critters
We have an overwhelming plethora of deer, bear, cats, fox, skunks, raccoons and other varmints that wreak havoc. Cats are especially troublesome as there is a feral cat factory a couple of blocks away. To help deal with this onslaught, I tweaked the SS actions, for AI animal detection, to throw events for animal motion detected at night. It tried attaching videos, with audio, as a .zip but no success.
Notes
- I installed an $29 bluetooth outdoor speaker to the side of the house and paired it with a Mac Mini running SS. In the actions I selected custom audio with a loud dog barking for 2 cams.
- For the driveway I installed a TP Link smart plug and joined it to HomeKit via a Hubitat C8 Pro (I believe TP Link also makes a plug for HomeKit native). I paired the smart plug to HomeKit and used HomeHelper to set up a new action. I chose this action from the SS actions menu. I connected the vac pipe to the vac exhaust to also blow air in addition to an uproarious noise when it switches on.
- For both cams, the barking dog audio is played for about 10 seconds
- For the driveway, the vacuum is turned on for 10 seconds. You can see it, covered with a white plastic bag, at the corner of the garage.
- I'm using the new Amcrest panoramic cam for the driveway. It has 2 sensors that are merged into one image (180 deg).
Comments
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what outdoor bluetooth are you using.
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Anker Soundcore 2 Portable Bluetooth Speaker with 12W Stereo Sound, Bluetooth 5. It's loud enough I can hear it in the house.
The price routinely goes up/down every couple of weeks. Last week it was $29. It is located about 35' from my Mac Mini. I attached it to the house trim panel (under the eave) with velcro. The battery only lasts about 8 hours, but that is usually long enough for critters until they're trained. You can also run it powered via USB and an extension cord. If I continue to experiment I may get an airplay speaker so I can send a separate stream of audio to the speaker. I also ordered a cheap 120ac loud leaf blower ($27) I can sub for the vacuum cleaner.
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It appears that I may need to rename the Kat Skat 2000 to the Deer-o-Matic 2000.
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The deer quickly get used to pretty much anything. I have a "flappy arm guy" on a motion detector, and it took them about 3 months to where they were ignoring it within 3-4 meters.
