After many nearly sleepless nights, "Crow Week" finally arrived! This is our annual hunting trip with Jerry Tomlin that we have been doing for 9 years and it is more a social event than a crow hunting expedition. We have four hunters in 2-day groups and we go for 8 days... this year we split it up into two 4-day stints with a week apart for rest. We had perfect weather until day 4 when the wind was blowing 15-20 mph.
At halftime, we laid down 43, 31, 91 and 51 crows. That is a total of 216 birds. Not a stellar number compared to many on the forum, but like I said, it is a lot of fun for us and includes hunting, sporting clays, good food & wine and lots of great fellowship.
Jerry works hard to get us in front of lots of birds. He has a strong network of pecan orchard owners ranging from Moultrie, GA to Columbia, SC. He is also a great scout who has backup orchards when we run into slow/no birds or call shy birds. Our hunting begins at sunup and usually ends by noon.
Fantastic. Believe it or not most people here don't get the big shoots and this qualifies as a big shoot!
Here the crows have not really began moving as in years past. I have more in my back yard [all two to 4 of them] than I have seen in newly cut cornfields despite the incredible abundance of food and lack of competition for these feeds except by deer and bear! Hundreds of freshly cut acres and no birds of any kind be it even sparrows or doves or anything even though non-game birds there is cause for concern-another story...I am just beginning to note the arrival of grackles from Canada and northern Maine...!!! WEIRD!!
I have noticed a very slight increase of crows-sorry!
So you are doing very very well..i wish I could do that. You have nothing to be ashamed of there!
Well done! Sounds like you had a great time. Those are good shoots and as far as numbers go I don't think we can ever kill enough to satisfy any of us, that is unique to this sport. But the fellowship stands out, spending time with family and good friends and add in getting to hunt Mr. Crow, that is pure enjoyment to this old redneck. Congrats!
I met Jerry in Birmingham back in the mid 90's at the Deer and Turkey Expo. He had a booth selling his crow hunting items. Like most "crow hunters" I thought I knew everything about crows. I could call in a bunch with a fight call and kill several. I thought I was it. After 20 minutes of talking with Jerry, I realized I knew NOTHING!
I walked away with an instructional video, decoys, and a couple of calls. And the education began. I was very lucky to meet someone willing to share his knowledge and techniques. Several years later I found this site and got to hunt with Bob for a long weekend. My education level increased again.
Crow hunting is a blast when it is done correctly. And it is a lot of work setting up correctly. But, well worth it.
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Demi, Well done.. how did the new "Bur" "etta" do for you?
Mark,
The new A400 Xtreme did it's job. Over the four days I only had one failure to fire on the second shot... And the problem was due to the fact that I failed to put shells in the magazine after shooting!
Demi
ElkHunter,
You are spot on with all points! There is much more than meets the eye. I've been doing it less than 10 years, and I feel that I have now gained Sophomore status!!
Good hunting!
Demi
-- Edited by Island Shooter on Tuesday 20th of October 2015 09:03:50 PM
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The man who thinks he can, and the man who thinks he can’t are both right.
