To introduce myself I have been an avid crow hunter for the past 5 seasons. I have learned many things from my mentor who introduced me to this great sport. My mentor has been hunting crow since he was about 7 years old, he would get paid a nickel for every crow he brought to his uncle who owned a farm on the eastern coast.
To say I have crow fever is an understatement... I have also visited this site for about a year now before I finally signed up. There have been a great many things I have learned from him but I try to soak up as much knowledge as I can. This year I have been most keen to understand the migration pattern of crow as it pertains to my region, my region being the midwest, aka Missouri, and all the states surrounding it.
I have been voraciously attempting to find specific migratory patterns or flyway regions to maximize my time and effort in pursuit of crow. Unfortunately, I have only been able to research pubs and manuals from around the 1950's, plus or minus a few decades.
I hear tales from my mentor and the other crow hunters that make up our squad of seasons past where they took thousands of crow. For the past number of years we have only taken 500 or less per year... I suppose my query is if anyone has experienced this in the past several years and or have you seen an increase or decrease in your respective hunting areas.
I have indeed seen a decrease ..frankly left the entire area I used to go in the 70s......nothing like your numbers in Missouri but none the less very significant but what actually happened is they shift their usual path to make another area even more numerous and maybe you must think outside the box now...
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Top Cat Statutes never replaced or rewrote the constitution!
I'm also in the midwest, Iowa, along the Mississippi River. A few years ago, there was a noticeable decrease in crows and bluejays from west nile virus but both seem to be coming back.
Currently we are preparing for a hunt the first week of December. In my immediate region we had about 50 or so come in this last weekend but we can not hunt due to it also being deer season. Standing population is roughly 100+ so I am anticipating a fun first hunt. I'll let you all know how it goes.