High Quality Webcams on West Country Rivers

Webcam of Fowey River at Twowatersfoot

The cameras currently refresh at 1 frame every 10 seconds. Farson Digital hope to be getting a sponsorship deal with a major broadband supplier sorted out shortly, in order to allow the cameras to stream live. The cameras Farson Digital use last 10 years and are made by a German company. They are used in the Arctic and have no moving parts and never freeze (-30° to +60°C ) and being German, they just work. The Environment Agency also use them in the UK. It’s a great solid state, all weather, 3 mega pixel camera that just plugs into a broadband connection and will stream live images at 25fps (pal), which is currently way too much for most of the broadband packages we are hooked up to.

Farson Digital have just signed a sponsorship deal with the West Country Rivers Trust, as they are very keen to promote West Country Fishing Tourism and see this as a great vehicle to do so. The Angling Trust, Salmon & Trout Association, Fishing Associations and various advertisers are seeing the benefits of being involved. Thirteen cameras are now up and running. The cameras have also proved to be a big hit with canoeists and other river users. Some viewers just like to watch the salmon running up the rivers and canoeists running down.


Webcam of Tamar River at Horsebridge

Farson Digital put up the first two cameras on the River Exe and River Taw and sold the advertising space reasonably easily, then decided to get a network up and running before entering into a campaign to bring on board more sponsors.


Webcam of Camel River at Nanstallon

This is an exciting project for local fishermen and tourism in the West Country. The current total for the 13 cameras is 91000 visits, each averaging about 2 minutes. Bearing in mind they have been coming on line in stages since May, and the last three came on line just last week, we think this is very encouraging for the future. The first camera online, at Exebridge on the River Exe, is fast approaching 28,000 visits. We are adding cameras regularly to the network and are hoping to have all the 14 major West Country Rivers fitted with cameras by the end of this year. Farson Digital are also talking with other regions about installing networks for them.

One of the main benefits of the cameras for fishermen is the ability to be able to check the river height and colour, if the water is to high and to coloured you will have a wasted journey, not to mention the fuel. Also, if one river is flood and unfishable due to a localised storm, you can check the webcams and quickly make arrangements to fish on another unaffected river.


Webcam of River Lyner at Rilla Mill

Farson Digital have created a 'fishing conditions update’ pop up window and blog. This appears in the centre of the webcam image in the same way as our timeline / water gauge picture does. The information/update is written by a 3rd party for each river/camera. You are able to click through to the camera’s blog, which is an interactive area between registered users and the blog administrator. This would generally be the person who is writing the reports. Great for angling tourists, tourists and locals alike, ‘The Voice of the River’.

Take a look at the cameras yourself here www.farsondigital.co.uk





Share