Yeah here I am stepping on sacred ground yet again..but sometimes the novice crow hunter might bypass a perfectly suitable call not made by a well known company. But here are the ones I recommend; Haydells', mallardtone, johnny stewart, HS Strut; Hammerin' crow call,Faulks' and PS OLt...for starters...the other models I've ran across I think were supposed to imitate young crows(?) or possibly the european crow(?) You want a crow call that sounds like a crow. Somewhere along the road though the Fish CRow was ignored. I don't know why. Naturally some insight is necessary? There's one with a soft barrel and let me tell you is one of the top ones I liked...I wish it was available to me years ago.
THose old antique ones? Like Charles Perdue(?) or JC HIggins(not junk but inflexible mouth piece)Herters'? To me useless junk. Just pretty and something of a bygone era. Don't take this type afield...it requires some modification but I don't know what? It clogs up if you look at it cross eyed! THere is much to be said on this. PLastic doesn't necessarily disqualify it, a couple of plastic ones are my favorites. This is just the opening as more will follow on this but it is a favorite topic and from what I've seen much needs to be said on the topic. And I am looking forward to it.
After doing a lot of reading and watching I had realized I was going to have to get a mouth call rather than rely on the electronic. I was hesatant at first. Sounded like it could take a long time to get proficient with one. I went with the faulks C-50 and within a few hours I was doing well. I won't go out without it now ! Should have done it years ago !
I still have one and it surprised me the first time I used it-wasn't expecting the results! I was using a PS OLt amnd the crows were smrtening up so I pulled out the Faulks' and made it sound like two crows were conversing-wow! Very interesting day!
When i got mine i was doing a lot of practicing with it here at home, ( while my wife was gone ) drives her crazy !! so i'm sitting in the living room CAWING up a storm on and off for an hour or so & i go in the kitchen & hear caw caw caw caw. at first i thought it was the ringing in my ears, then i hear it again so i mute the tv. There was a crow atop the oak tree about 50 feet off my back porch just cawwing away. I thought to myself, dang, this thing realy works ! i will leave it to your imagination as to what happened to the crow. I do want to hear some input on this topic, once while out the reed cracked on my call and left it useless so i think having two with is a good idea. especially with different tones. i find it kinda tricky to have one hand cupping the call while getting ready to take a shot, do any calls work just by blowing & no hands required ?
If you don't have a Gibson crow call, you don't have a crow call. Mine is a Short Magnum, and even I can call crows with it! I'm sure that there are other good crow calls around. But if you can have but one call, get a Gibson!
His e-mail ... gibson152@bellsouth.net
This is the last e-mail I have for him...hope it works.
After doing a lot of reading and watching I had realized I was going to have to get a mouth call rather than rely on the electronic. I was hesatant at first.
Just as a clarification for some who may be new to the sport: It‘s not an either/or choice between mouth and electronic calls. The best method, IMO, is a mouth call to supplement your electronic. This gives you better variety and keeps the crows guessing.
Good hunting!
Demi
__________________
The man who thinks he can, and the man who thinks he can’t are both right.
If you don't have a Gibson crow call, you don't have a crow call. Mine is a Short Magnum, and even I can call crows with it! I'm sure that there are other good crow calls around. But if you can have but one call, get a Gibson!
His e-mail ... gibson152@bellsouth.net
This is the last e-mail I have for him...hope it works.
KenCrow
While I have more mouth calls than I'll ever need I still love getting input on others' choices and why...some require tuning. I found deeper calls more effective....Lohman is great because you can use a higher pitched call and the deeper sound will make it sound right! On the other hand a PS Olt is great to work with deeper calls, but not the onlky one. Just that I started out with PS Olt-we otherwise had nothing else and they worked great but excepting me no one seemed to know how to blow one! Whn I got my first wooden call it blew my mine! I am sure it was either a Mallardtone or Faulks' followed by Lohman...I learned a lot from the different pitches often lower than a PS Olt...
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Tuesday 20th of February 2018 01:00:27 AM
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Tuesday 20th of February 2018 01:02:05 AM
I am fairly new to this but I don't have an e-caller so I only hand call. I have 2 Mincey calls that I really like. One of them is lower and softer than the other and I like to use this one when I have them coming in already because it sounds realistic but doesn't seem to advertise my location as much. I have a Mallardtone that's get a lot of use and a Gibson Short Magnum that I use as a longer range call. The only other call I carry with me is a Lohman Gold that is very high pitched.
I seem to gravitate to the wooden mouthpiece calls as they don't seem to stick as quickly for me...
BTW- Boba's Crow Calling CD was a tremendous help to me learning what my calling SHOULD sound like. I highly recommend it!!
Some crow calls need a little fine tuning but if you can sounds like a crow it doesn't matter who made it. None the less I am partial to the calls I use which specific pitches. I don't rely too much on electronic calls only because I got to walk a little ways out there; rather carry more ammunition and I don't have the crow resource anyways. And any ways of late say last fall they all came in at once anyways; one shot done for the day. I used to use both in conjunction/electronic and manual-works really nice if you can be out a few hours unlike me(and have a steady supply of crows!)...bang bang bye bye!
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Tuesday 20th of February 2018 03:24:07 PM
Here is one weird looking crow call..for starters it's bright red and will need a little fine tuning to be "competitive" but no reason to pass it up. A persons' personal skills will always compensate for otherwise poor calling techniques...I think anyways...anyways a relative mediocre call...which is what I mean..
But others sound like this one too but it's not the worst-as I said before-fine tuning can take a mediocre crow call and make it competitive. And it is."MK UNique designs" and how true! But in my book no crow call should require any tuning at all but the end results are what counts...
I would like to point out years ago I had a baby crow call on tape and it simply didn't work. Some others even though adults oddly didn't work either but one especially did. Got to try them out to see which does work even though that sounds weird. But getting past the recorded calls my mouth blown calls always worked. And often just as good. So here again I'd rather just lug an extra box or two of ammo versus a fancy dancy crow caller given a lack of crows in a historically populated crow area...
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Thursday 22nd of February 2018 07:53:55 AM
This no name call is a type I bought years ago and it was quite a unit!I tried it one day and was amazed! This is what I meant by a "sleeper"...it worked like any other good call I had used...great price too!
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Sunday 25th of February 2018 07:04:57 AM
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Sunday 25th of February 2018 07:06:37 AM
I use Haydel's crow calls exclusively and have never used a better call...
One of my favorites-can't beat 'em! The price is right and speaking of price; since it seems BobA said he used mallardtone the prices are climbing faster than heat on the prairies!!
-- Edited by killer Crowalski on Tuesday 27th of February 2018 07:51:19 PM
