That's really great in Belgium! We looked into it, but haven't tested it. Some reviews say it is very CTs model dependent, but surely something that we need to take a look! Thanks for sharing! 

We have also used Reconyx and Browning camera traps for years with NiMH rechargeables batteries of the brand Eneloop. They have worked very well for us.

Not all Browning trail cameras work properly with rechargeable batteries.  e.g. the Browning Recon Force 4K mostly works okay but does exhibit some banding in recorded video, mainly in infrared mode.  This is the most common failure mode for cameras that don't properly support rechargeable batteries.  If you're only interested in still images then you're often fine (although may experience harder to prove issues, like missed or delayed recordings).

The battery brand & model is irrelevant (I've used many, including Eneloops) - the problem is that many of these cameras are designed exclusively for the higher voltage (1.4V+) of alkalines / lithiums, not the 1.1V - 1.2V of NiMH.  Compatibility tends to be worse the cheaper the camera - I've not heard of any other than the Reconyx (representing the high end) that even officially acknowledge the existence of NiMH rechargeables.

There are ways to modify the battery packs of many of these cameras to include more batteries in series, in order to bring the voltage up to what they expect.  Sometimes this can be done without externally-visible changes (by just rewiring some batteries from parallel to series within the existing space), thus without compromising the natural weather resistance of the camera.  There are a few guides online.

This is great! Thank you very much for sharing! Definitely would try the rechargeable for Reconyx and Browning.

To follow up, does anyone has tried rechargeable batteries for more economic camera such as China-made GardePro or Meidase? 

Thank you for sharing! I didn't even consider the rechargeable li-on AA cells, since what I had in my only the more available li-on such as 10500 size.

I am currently testing one camera trap with Li-ion batteries and they are doing much better than the NiMH rechargeable batteries that I used before. The camera has been working for about 5 months, taking on average at least 2 images and 2 20-second videos during daytime ( in fact taking many more, including night time images and videos but I don't have any averages readily available in my head ) and it still reports three bars out of three on the battery indicator.

Keep in mind that different battery chemistries have different discharge curves (voltage vs energy remaining).  Single-use batteries are what most devices are calibrated for, and they tend to have a relatively linear discharge curve (making it relatively easy to gauge their actual remaining energy).  Rechargeable batteries tend to have a sharper drop-off at the end of each use cycle, even moreso for lithium-based chemistries over NiMH.  This leads to misleading indicators, with devices claiming to still have significant charge, only to suddenly "change their minds" and rapidly drop to empty (or, especially for Li-ion, for the device to claim e.g. 80% battery left, and yet abruptly power off).

The difference is most pronounced at lower temperatures and higher currents.

See, for example, this paper (page 27 has the key charts):

An update on my earlier reply. Only 5 days after writing it, I checked the camera trap and the batteries were drained. 6 out of 8 were completely drained, down to about 0,015V, and 2 still had a charge of 1 V.

What surprises me is that it happened in the time of a week. A week ago the camera's battery indicator showed 3 bars out of 3, now they were drained completely. I will add a separate post about this

@Wade thank you so much for sharing this knowledge! I am sorry to hear what happened to your camera traps@Frank_van_der_Most , but these finding for your experiment hits me for future consideration!

Thanks for the update @Frank_van_der_Most . I have been curious about the AA Li-Ion/Li-Po batteries and how they perform. The sudden drop in reported voltage will likely be from the internal voltage regulator switching off when the internal cell gets to the low voltage threshold (usually around 3V) to avoid damage to the cell. Looking now at a discharge curve they show a constant 1.5V, then a step down to 1.1V before dropping to zero. I don't know how you can possibly test these externally to know how much energy they have left until you hit the 1.1V step. 

Hi Alistair @alsnothome , see the comments of @Amanda_Matthes at the post here. Basically, it is not easy

Mas Panji,

Great stuff! will check DLH out! 

That is very interesting, would you be able to share the result of your trial later? I hope it will worth investing on premium Li-ion rechargeable, maybe it will turn out to be at least same cost as alkaline but better for environment (assuming the production is responsible).

Will talk to you later~

Cheers!

Mas Herdhanu,

It seems that there are specialized bins for K3 waste in every train station now, although I am not sure how they dispose whatever that has been thrown there.

Thanks for following up mas Panji! I also just randomly exposed by DKI Jakarta youtube channel that they also has partnership for this battery waste management and has many dropbox around the region. Hopefully it's not dropped by the current PJ lol.

Ini di stasiun mana mas Panji?