Bird Buddy reviews and discussion

I am pleased and excited about my Bird Buddy!! It took a long time to arrive (it is a Kickstarter/Indiegogo project in the middle of COVID) but we all know that is a possibility! I accept the possibility that some of the units may have manufacturing/technical problems but mine worked great! If you aren't expecting pictures of birds that don't exist in your area, or flawless operation out of the box, it is a great buy! The company updates as needed, keeps customers informed and has created a space for members to share and discuss modifications that are VERY helpful. Beautiful, strong design, pretty decent camera. AI is developing and I am sure will improve. The charging is an issue. I can't tell you the protocol for apps but I do know this one doesn't follow the usual steps but still possible to figure out. I HAVE recommended it to friends, share my pictures often and would consider buying another at some point.

good picture. nice detail. cumbersome app. terrible battery even with solar panel. in cold wether i get 1-2 days. pluggging in to wall outlet on-going.

It’s a Kickstarter, which means it took longer than anticipated and is still working out some bugs… but honestly, I knew that going in so I’m just thrilled with this product! I’ve been posting my birdy photos and even my non birder friends are loving them! It’s been one of my favorite things and I just love seeing the birds at my feeder. I can’t wait until Spring when we got a larger variety of birds but this will get me through the shorter days of winter!

I'm a "seasoned" Indiegogo/Kickstarter investor, so I knew I was in for a bit of a wait, and my patience paid off. My wife is over the moon with her early Christmas gift. The Bird Buddy is well designed and works as promised. Sure, I'd love a bit more battery life, but I understand there's testing going on that may draw down the battery a bit more for a time and it's a minor inconvenience to bring the camera in to charge it. The real charge is getting a notification that we have new postcards! So fun to get up close and personal with our visitors.

Bird Buddy has been an absolute delight! I love receiving notifications that there's been a visitor at my feeder through my day. I've been ranting and raving about it the moment I received mine. With the App you can "share" the feeder with up to 3 people, and within the first couple of days owning mine, I had already filled those slots with my friends and family. Setting the device and App up is easy and convenient, and filling it is a breeze! Even removing the camra to charge is simple. My camra needs to be charged ~ every other day, but it times in with how often I need to fill my feeder anyways, so the day it's empty I bring the camra in at night to charge, then connect and refill in the morning! I've always fondly observed the birds eat and socialize from my feeders, but the Bird Buddy has given a more personal view into their lives. I've seen pairs, I've seen babies, I've seen the elderly at my feeder. With the help of Bird Buddy I was able to I.D. a bird I've seen for years, but could never get close enough to be able to appropriately identify (it was a White-Throated Sparrow, my best assumption was a Carolina Wren all this time!). I've had visitors that I have *never* seen in my yard before, and probably never would have, if I didn't have this feeder. Being able to have all these adorable, great quality, pictures of the local beepers is fantastic, but I think my favorite part about it is, when you identify a bird you're given facts about them! What they eat, where they can be found - even they're call/songs ( and more but I don't want to spoil it ;3 )! I was blown away by the quality of this product, and all of my friend's and family that I've introduced to Bird Buddy have been equally enthralled ( and promptly purchased their own, lol )! Whether you're an avid birder, a professional ornithologist, or you just like seeing the local birds with a fresh cup of coffee in the morning like me, I cannot recommend this feeder enough.

I've been an avid bird feeder all my adult years, so was really excited about this product. After a long delay, it finally showed up last week. Here are my observations after a week of use: PROS: - The build seems to be solid quality-wise. - You get a couple of options to deploy the unit (I got the hanging nylon cord and a pole mount. I did not get the wall mount in the picture but maybe that was an extra option?). - The app isn't perfect but is cute, fun, and functional. - The excitement of being notified about a 'new visitor' is REAL and great fun hoping it's a new type of bird :-) CONS: - Battery life is LAME. Expect to bring it in and charge it every couple of days. To make matters worse, charging is slow... so I recommend you bring in and charge overnight else you might miss many visitors during charge cycles. - The Solar Roof addon is pretty much a waste of money. After repositioning my feeder to have the solar panel pointing south thought I solved the problem as it did maintain, and even increased the charge level slightly during the day. However, 1) that was on a super bright and sunny day and even after being over 60% at sundown, by 8 am the next morning was again warning me the battery was less than 10%. and 2) On anything but super clear days doesn't seem to help at all. - The 'universal pole mount' didn't fit my current poles (the diameter of the mount was too small). I use these same diameter poles with a variety of feeders from different manufacturers so not sure the mount provided so 'universal'. - The app is mostly OK and honestly kinda cute, but 1) It makes you pick the pictures you want to keep before you see them all so you usually end up accepting pictures you don't want to keep later because you don't know if others are going to be better. As a coder myself, this should be an easy fix and something that needs to happen ASAP (just give me a list of all the pics with a checkbox by each one so I can tick the ones to keep), and 2) You only get access to new visitors through app notifications (which u can tap and goto see the new visitor) when instead I should be able to just launch the app and be greeted immediately with info on new visitors IMHO. Final word. I LOVE this device even with its flaws. It is imperative that they address noted flaws asap as already clone devices from China and other countries flooding the market which is a real pity. I received Tweets/replies from others telling me how it's a scam and not a real product etc. but I am happy to say that's not the case. It is a VERY real and cool little product. It just needs some upgrades asap. I suspect some of the naysayers might have bought into the crap copies starting to flood the market. The *official* Bird Buddy product is in no way a scam.

As with all kickstarter programs there are some technical and design issues, but overall this product does what is says on the label. Was worth investing in as a keen birder and waiting for the product to arrive. A little patience was required once it was set up and connected for the AI to get the first 'postcards'.

Backed the BirdBuddy Kickstarter project in Nov2020 knowing how much my family would enjoy it. Waiting through a global pandemic, supply chain issues and general Kickstarter development, we received our BirdBuddy two plus years later. And we couldn’t be happier. The BirdBuddy Team is great. All through the development process they kept us informed every step along the way. Just adding to the anticipation. And from the first moment of opening the box you can tell every detail was taken into account. Unboxing was easy. Setup instructions were clear. While the camera was charging for the first time, we went to the Wild Birds Unlimited store to pick up pole for our BirdBuddy feeder to sit upon. Within hours of setting up BirdBuddy we got our first visitor (Blue Jay) and then our next (Tufted Tit Mouse) and they keep coming. And we get to enjoy close up photos of our fine feathered friends from the comfort of the internet. I am sharing photos with my friends and family and they are all amazed at the clarity of the photos. This is so much fun. And the fun doesn’t stop there. I have also joined the BirdBuddy Community on Facebook where I am sharing my photos and experiences with others. The BirdBuddy team is also actively participating in the discussion. In one instance, the BirdBuddy team updated the app based on the comments in the community. Between the firmware in the onboard camera in the feeder and the accompanying MyBirdBuddy app, the team will continue to make improvements and add features that will make the whole Bird Buddy experience better and better. Overall, I am so very happy that I backed this project.

I'm really really enjoying the feeder. The photos are fun--some are hilarious and unexpected. I look forward to new pictures each day and I'm hoping to capture something unexpected that I haven't seen on one of our feeders before!!

Two years ago I backed Bird Buddy on Kickstarter. I appreciated their monthly updates about how COVID quarantines, the chip shortage, and shipping delays impacted their schedule. It was a fascinating process. I was thrilled when my Bird Buddy arrived. It took several hours to charge the camera and update the firmware. Then it took 6 days before I started to get photos delivered to my phone as the birds got used to the new feeder. It doesn't always send me photos. Sometimes the birds perch off to the side, and sometimes I think they're not sitting long enough to get a clear photo. The Bird Buddy AI is impressive in that it weeds out the out-of-focus photos and the photos of just random feathers. Instead, it has been sending me high-quality photos of my visiting birds. The image quality is fantastic. Everyone I've shared the photos with has been impressed. My daughters really enjoy clicking on the postcards that come via the app to see who our most recent bird visitors are. After 5 days of getting an increasing number of photos, I noticed a photo of a house finch with wart-like growths on the bird. I verified with the Game Commission that the finch likely had avian pox. So I took down our feeders. I disinfected them and will put them back out in a few weeks. I never would have noticed the sick bird if it wasn't for our Bird Buddy. I think this product will entertain people, educate people on birds, and could potentially be used as an important citizen science tool to document avian diseases, bird populations and bird behaviors.

I LOVE MY BIRD BUDDY!! :) Maybe it's the long anticipation or I'm just easily excited but Bird Buddy has been well worth the wait for me! Getting tons of gorgeous photos most days and can't wait for them to add video as well. For anyone interested there's a website with photos coming from the Bird Buddy community at social.mybirdbuddy.com which is a treat to browse! Would definitely recommend!

I am thrilled with the product! For several years I was looking for this product, I tried to do the same thing with surveillance cameras without any real success. It really is a unique product. It is easy for me to upload my photos, to rework it if necessary with my applications. Really I love it!

So I've been waiting for this thing for 2 years, almost losing hope that I'll ever get it and then it finally arrives last week. It backed it as a Kickstarter project so I was always ready for it to be not great but I have to tell you that it's exceeded my expectations in almost every way. From the build quality and the overall experience getting it to setting it up and using it for the first week it's just been amazing. It creates gorgeous photos and correctly recognizes the large majority of birds that visit. It's exactly what I wanted it to be. The wifi works surprisingly well and I haven't had any issues with that. Photos are gorgeous and the overall design of the product is really well thought out as refilling it is really easy and recharging is really easy with the magnet attached module. I have the fence mount and it feels really solid and works perfectly.

The updates and notifications I get make my entire day better. I absolutely love it.

I love the videos and pics I get from my humming bird feeder. It was so easy to set up.

Fantastic AI, pictures and experience. Really helps me know what's in my backyard and around the world.

I've really enjoyed it so far. Takes great pictures and videos and I love I can share my feeder with family

I’ve really enjoyed my BirdBuddy! It’s very easy to set up and connect to Bluetooth. I highly recommend getting one!

I love seeing the different species and learning their habits and voices.

This bird feeder is an amazing product that allows pictures and viewing livestream birds and so much more