The monitoring of small mammals has been greatly facilitated by the recently developed
camera trap-boxes (e.g., McCleery et al. 2014, Soinien et al. 2015, Aegerter 2019, Croose &
Carter 2019, Mos & Hofmeester 2020, Littlewood et al. 2021).

For a research project at the Natural History Museum St.Gallen, in the course of which the
altitudinal distribution of various small mammals and invertebrates in north-eastern Switzer-
land is being monitored, a novel camera trap-box was developed and optimised for usage in
mountainous areas based on previous designs. Important for the development of this new
“MiniMammalCamBox” was that (1) it is kept as light and robust as possible; (2) it records as
many diagnostic features of the photographed animal as possible; and (3) the resulting photo-
graphs appear as close to reality as possible, so that they can also be used for other purposes
(e.g. illustrations, museum exhibitions).

The MiniMammalCamBox is based on commercially available, inexpensive plastic-boxes mea-
suring 30 cm x 40 cm x 17 cm. A camera trap (Reconyx HP2X S) was fixed to the inside of one
wall and a large opening was cut into the opposite wall (Figure 6). A scale can be mounted
above the opening for size comparisons. Camouflage painting was applied to protect against
theft (Figure 7). Additional side walls in the corners to the left and right of the camera trap also
prevent small mammals triggering the trap without being imaged (Figure 13). Several Mini-
MammalCamBoxes in different stages of development have been used in different test runs,
including the aforementioned research project, and the first results are promising (e.g., Figures
14, 15, and 17) .

Full report in German: https://naturinfo.ch/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Naturinfo-Methodenreport_MiniMammalCamBox.pdf