I started out early this morning. Get at 4 is just something I am not fond of. Yes I know its a must to get the early morning flight, but I really am not a morning person. So after crawling out of the house and to the truck. I met up with the fellows this morning. Jeff, Logan and Trae finally showed. I really don't think I have been that fired up in a while.
Its early.
I have held off of what we call the cow pasture for a year. I knew that it was going to be a good run. Here is the layout.
Now from the truck to the stand is about a 20 minute walk. Its one the back and I mean backside of public gamelands, so its all foot traffic. After walking across the county here is what the bottom cutover looked like. The pic was taken from the top of the hill, we still had a good 5 minutes from here.
Once we got to the bottom and the 12 to 15 foot pine. I put the dekes out and employed my new get the decoy up in the air pole.
I was able to get everyone settled in to a hole for the mornings hunt.
Jeff trying to hide behind a pine. Ya, I thought it was funny too.
I don't know what Trae was looking at, the birds usually come from above.
We got to hole with the sun coming up and with the birds starting to wake up. I was rolling to get everything done. I just knew that one of these birds would have caught me. I finally got to turn the Foxpro on and then hit the hand calls. I had a bird come in to the hand calls but he flared way out of range. OK, skip this and go full bore with the crow fight. Now I had told everyone that I would call the shot. Which means no one fires till it is called. In about 1 minute the birds came out of the tall pines to mob us. Now,I am used to 3 to 5 birds , if that coming in at a time. Which for the 4 of us would have been great. But when you have 40 to 50 birds come in, well lets just say it was an OH S**T moment for me. Instead of them just sending a scout in, they sent to hole freaking army. We are right down the road from the National Guard range. I guess they had be taken notes. At this point I am looking into a mob of crows. I have never called this many crows at one time. This should be one heck of a mess getting ready to happen.
The birds are coming. Just a few more seconds. Wait. Wait. They are almost in range. Just one more sec, BOOM , BOOM , BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What the ell!!!!!!!!!!! I did not call the shot. They jumped the gun. @!#%@$%!!!!!!!!! The largest flock for me to date and these ding dings, jump the gun. The birds were to high and to far. 2 more seconds and we could had 10 a piece to shoot at. !#$@$%@$
OK, I had to calm down and regroup and remind them that they need to wait. Now I am asking myself how bad did we get busted. So I shut everything down and just sat their for a minute to let everything settle down. 5 minutes go by and I jumped back on the hand calls. I could hear the crows far off, so I turned the Foxpro back on. I flipped between the crow fight and the distress. Then I dropped in something new. They had sent in a scout and he turned. So while the fight was running I dropped the Raspy Old Hand Call on top of the fight. Now its one like a chicken bone. The one crow turned and when he turned they all came back. Oh OK , here we go again. The birds came back in and the guys waited this time. Now the birds stayed up in the air and we pushed out chokes to the limit, and then some.
Logan stretched and I mean stretched the Browning out. It was one of those shots to where you just say OH CRAP!! I had a bead on this bird. I mean he had done went pass everyone else and was flying the PP shoot me flag. NOPE this bird gets about 20 yards to my left, chip shot, then Logan pulls up and with one shot drops this bird at about 45 yards. OH CRAP! I asked him how in the crap. He said , " I pulled the trigger and the bird fell."
Logan and Trae looking at his bird or posing.
We were able to run about an hour in this hole. The birds kept coming back for more but they just kept getting higher and higher. All in all it was a good day. The guys get to break in their new guns and I got to see what a North Carolina mob of birds really looks like. A couple of things that I learnd today. One, make sure everyone understands what the called shot is. Two, large flocks are cool to look at but I would prefer a couple of hours of small groups coming in.
Good story Puppypopper. 40-50 crows responding at once is normal for me here at this time of the year. Things can get rather confusing with that kind of air traffic overhead.
My trick is to set my caller up in some taller trees and shoot from lower stuff nearby. The crow's will circle the taller trees fixating on the sound while trying to figure out whats going on. Simply pop up nail a couple bandits and duck down again. They will then fade off and often return for a couple more rounds.
I never use any deeks for this kind of hunting. The big angry mob of real crows circling is enough to get their attention and keep others pouring in. If the crows spot you it's over and off to another spot.
Ted
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Life's tough... It's even tougher if you're stupid. John Wayne
Had the same luck this morning only hunting solo I have hunted these birds bout 4 times sence July 4 th I have all ready taken 30+ birds from this flock and this morning they proved they are educated in stead of 1-3 coming in they would land in trees out of range till there was6-10 then they would come in for a look. And then they would do a fly by half right over the tree row I am hiding in making for a tough threw the tree shot or they would be 35/40 yds out in the field. I ended up with 8 confirmed and a few limping flyers. I expected them to be a little educated but these ones are phd so I am done busting these ones till the snow flys. I had prolly 60-70 birds come by in them med groups must have been something the crows all over were doing being grouped up as they checked things out.
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If you are gonna be dumb you gotta be tough
You can't fix stupid!
O yeah I kant spel eether
I read you're report, this is why two's company and three is a crowd in regard to crow hunting. Two guys can handle any crow situation no matter how intense the shooting may be. Everybody has to learn, I realize that, but as time goes on you will come to the same conclusion. The main thing is that you had fun getting after them.
Bob A.
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To listen to this radio talk show go to episode 12, Bob Aronsohn
Bob, your right. We had a good time but now that I have learned, never again or I will be hard pressed to take a group out to one of my holes. It is just to frustrating. Jon and myself shot that hole over a year ago and we had Black Rain falling from the sky. Now I get it. If I can't hunt with Jon, I'll just hunt alone.
Yea Puppy 3's a crowd!! I almost had my eardrums blown out because of too many in the blind! Its a hinderance more than a help. Some times it sucks trying to be nice!!
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"LOAD and RELOAD" "NEVER FORGET THOSE THAT TOOK A HIT FOR YOU EVEN WHEN THEY DID'T KNOW YOU" U.S. VETERANS!!
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Yea Puppy 3's a crowd!! I almost had my eardrums blown out because of too many in the blind! Its a hinderance more than a help. Some times it sucks trying to be nice!!
