I've been inactive for a while but I thought I'd pop in to say hi.
Life's been good and I've learned a lot and hunted crows (and foxes, boar, ducks etc.) since last I've been here. We've brought up the sons count to three, I've added a good bit to my hunting gear and finally got a dog. A fine Labrador lady named Katie.
I hope it's interesting or you where we started in germany (as far as I can tell anyway) and where we are now.
Crow hunting with decoys really became quite popular about ten years ago. As a general rule we don't nearly get as many crows in one go as you do. Two digits are always good. My best ever day was 52 and the most I've ever seen shot in a day in germany was 78 (one blind).
It was fairly obvious that bare plastic decoys were no good so the flocked variety became the standard. Because the flock gets damaged easily somebody had the brilliant idea to pull black socks over the decoys, thus making them cheaper and much more durable. As confidence decoys I use pigeons, Magpies and a plastic heron.
After a short while people saw the need to have very tight blinds that the sun could not penetrate at all. Moving shapes in the blinds sent the crows ignoring or fleeing the decoys.
At the time it was possible to have a blind without extra cover in the middle of fields.
Obviously crows are quick learners, so that now the blinds must be in cover and there disguised with branches etc. Otherwise there'd be hardly any success.
The importance of sentinels became quite clear as they suggest safety, increase visibility of the decoys and enabled us to steer the crows into or away from certain approach lines towards the blind. As lofting poles we usually use the poles used by the Army to hold up Camouflage nets.
A belgian call maker started to make crow calls for european crows as in general their voices are lower than the american counterparts. In the meantime more german call makers have started and brought out very good low crow calls. I was lucky that Mr Gibson and another company made some very low sounding calls for me and I still use them. In total I usually bring six different calls on my lanyard. Sometimes I use a magpie in distress or hare in distress call to get their attention when they get lazy or sit on far away observation points. I've even used a goose call to add variety as they share a similar food source. Plastic calls are not very popular here, the Haydels tripple tone was the only plastic call I ever really liked.
We do make quite a fuss about crow hunting as the european crows seem smarter or more careful than their cousins abroad. Some videos we see from the UK or the US would not be possible here. If we forget to bring in a dead crow, they'll not approach the decoys. Dirt, frost or even dew on the decoys and there's no hope of success. Crow magnets work 3 or 4 times, after that, that spinning thing will chase away the crows faster than you can imagine. As a result we need to help newcomers to learn this game properly. "Each one teach one" is a must and I regularly visit people to explain and hunt with them to help them understand what's going on.
Because the crows will learn from mistakes faster than we do....
Enlosed pics of sentinels, a picture of a sub standard blind but with a homemade camo net and some crows we shot from a blind you can maybe see behind the pile of gear.
