Calling in crows

Southern

Well-Known Member
When I was a boy, we had a lot of crows on the farm, and I learned a lot of stalking and observation skills by stalking them close enough ( inside 100 yards ) for a kill with my .22 LR. We also would set up decoys we had carved or molded in paper mache', or a dead crow, and then call the crows in for some shotgunning. I was always surprised at how many would come to the call of an injured crow, even keep coming as we shot more from the sky.

Is any calling ( with mouth calls ) done in the UK?
 
Think its illegal over hear to use an artificial caller for birds,have heard that it works very well though for photographing but illegal to shoot them.....
 
Technically it states "any recording" so a synthesised electronic call would be OK. Obviously this law came about before such devices were common place so may be a bit of a grey area.
So my camera film pot with a few air rifle pellets in is still legal for magpies, phew. Lol
 
Think its illegal over hear to use an artificial caller for birds,have heard that it works very well though for photographing but illegal to shoot them.....
Are you saying no mouth blown calls, or just no electronic recordings and players?

Most states in the US, it is unlawful to use electronic callers for anything but predators, like coyotes. Some states, like Texas, permitted electronic callers for crows, but I think no longer. Other states, which permitted no electronic calls at all, have now permitted them for coyotes, but if a fox or comes in, you cannot shoot them.

I have used mouth calls for crows, ducks and geese, foxes, bobcats, coyotes, feral dogs, and even bears.

Decoys: I know you have them for pigeons, because I have studied the UK magazines and carved my own pigeon decoys around what I see there. How about crows decoys in the UK?
 
Southern, shooting crows over decoys is very rewarding and takes a good bit of fieldcraft. I don't know about US crows but our native carrion crows are very wily and take some deceiving to get them to drop into a pattern of decoys, their eyesight is also exceptionally good so a good hide/blind is also a must. I use a primos mouth blown crow call along with the Deeks to help convince the birds to commit. As previously said, electronic calls for birds are not allowed but manual calls are. If your target species are crows, it isn't unusual to get jackdaws, rooks (both are black corvids similar to crows) and the occasional wood pigeon to end up in the bag too.

I'm nowhere near being an expert but It is a very satisfying form of shooting.
 
Very satisfying because it does require a lot of fieldcraft, and a variety of skills, to call in birds to decoys and then to shoot them. You have to learn a lot about ducks, geese, crows and turkeys to know how to set the decoys for a particular location, time of day, season, etc, in order to make them realistic and not arouse suspicion. And the shots can be quite fast.

I think a lot of people overlook how much they can learn from small game hunting about observation, reading tracks and other signs, concealment, patience, stealth, and judging range and wind. If you can fool a flock of crows, or get past their sentry to take out one or two feeding in a field, you can do the same with a herd of deer or a pair of foxes or coyotes.
 
That is quite a pile of birds! The dog seems happy after a full day's work.

I would like to know more of what sort of decoy setup you used, and how you got that many crows and ravens to keep coming in. Did your dog keep removing them from the field as you shot, or did you just leave them out there as more decoys?

I have only had crows keep coming in when I wounded one, and it lay on the ground, calling. They seemed to want to come rescue it or avenge things, and I shot some more, but nothing like that of yours.
 
That is quite a pile of birds! The dog seems happy after a full day's work.

I would like to know more of what sort of decoy setup you used, and how you got that many crows and ravens to keep coming in. Did your dog keep removing them from the field as you shot, or did you just leave them out there as more decoys?

I have only had crows keep coming in when I wounded one, and it lay on the ground, calling. They seemed to want to come rescue it or avenge things, and I shot some more, but nothing like that of yours.

The bag consisted of Rooks, Crows, Jackdaws, and pigeons. Raven are a protected species here.

I was shooting over drilled barley, in May, a few years ago.



On the first day I used four crow decoys, and,a dozen pigeon decoys. As birds were shot, I added them to the decoys. I only sent the dog for runners.



My hide is in the Whin (Gorse) bushes in the above picture. Well hidden, I used a call to get the birds to come in.

Over four days I shot (picked) 308 birds. Without looking back in my records, I can not remember numbers of each species, I'm afraid, but do recall that I fired about 600 cartridges.

By the fourth day, the birds remaining decided it would be better to eat elsewhere.

I have shot many decent bags of crows, during the Winter, when they have been on sheep feed. Again, a good hide is essential. Do not move until the bird is so close that it can not get out of range before you can shoot.


Steve.
 
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