i live in upstate south carolina and i've been hunting with a johnny stewart cassette caller my sucess is nothing like what anybody else posts here. we try to run and gun and we might kill a half dozen to a dozen birds at best. is that the best that can be expected in my part of the country? do i need a better caller i know that they have better callers out there. we run and gun because we don't have anywhere to go and just set up and stay for the long haul. all we get to hunt is game managment land. are we missing out on some birds by not staying and leaving the call running longer. we usally get to shoot 2 to 3 times at the same birds. if we keep calling will they come back? we have a half dozen decoys and a owl to use and they tend to help. what do i need to do to start seeing more birds.
The drawbacks of cassette callers does not include effectiveness at calling birds. 10gacrowshooter and I still use cassette callers and we do well for our part of the country. We are also limited to about half a dozen locations to hunt in our area do to the urbanization of the last 30 years in this area pushing the farms out. Birds that have been shot at tend not to come back if they saw the gunners and were close to action. Birds that were further away from the shooting may have left but not really received an education. I think owl decoys are more work to lug out than they are worth.
Whose sounds are you using and what are they? I think J/S is hands down the best sounds on cassette and the Crows Fighting Owl and Crow Come Here the two best tapes.
Do you hunt during the crow migration? That is the time one shoots good numbers. I ask because most people are not dedicated crow hunters as the fall migration comes when the other game seasons are open and they miss it.
Your caller is not the reason for lack of shootable birds.
your best bet is to secure permission from cattle (or better yet,) pig farmers who have the large numbers of birds hanging around, do whatever it takes to get "in" with them and then take good care of them,respect their property, clean up your mess etc.
and the best bit of advice once you find the numbers is to build a blind so good you are practically invisible, that includes camo for you head to toe.
no quick movements when getting ready to shoot either.
don't blast the "crow fight" all the time either, better off with more natural soft calling and a good setup,anyway thats my 2 cents, good luck
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"There is never a wrong time to do the right thing"
Don't get discouraged by the big number posts you are seeing here. You (like me) live in a tough part of the country to post up big numbers. A really good shoot for me is anything over 10 birds. Most days I shoot between 0 and 5 birds. I have had a few shoots in the past couple seasons that I was able to put up 20+ but, I still haven't broken the 30 bird day yet. The only reason I have been doing better lately is I have been scouting this area for 5 years now and am finally starting to get "in" with some farmers and hitting the fields when the birds are there. I used a JS cassette for the first 3 years with success but have since gone to a Foxpro just because I was getting lazy about tapes and cords.
Just keep at it and you will start to figure out what works for you in your area. I would really try to get some access to private land. I know its tough down south but the worst the landowner can say is no. Don't rule out USFWS Wildlife Refuges either. Some of them allow crow hunting...
Just how I like them "low and slow"