Crow season opens Sunday at noon. I am going to clean the Ithaca tonight and swap out the choke for a new extended full I got from Briley. I am going to step it up a little this year with more choke and use #6 heavy field loads hopefully it will help me make more kills.
-- Edited by oldshotty on Tuesday 17th of July 2018 07:15:58 PM
-- Edited by oldshotty on Tuesday 24th of July 2018 04:31:56 AM
If I've counted correctly, I still have 94 days before the fall season opens. There is plenty to keep this student of the way of the crow occupied learning to become a more skillful hunter. Have a great time and best of luck. Looking forward to some fresh hunt reports. Please include photos.
I need decoys but will probably just cut some silhouettes out of black cloth or socks.
Last season, I used cardboard silhouettes painted flat black. Stuck them on pieces of clothes hanger wire so they could move with the breeze. With primary elections over, I'm gonna cruise around and pick up some election signs and use them. I plan on giving them some depth this year by sliding some "wings" on the body , like I've seen in some of Old Artilleryman's photos from his hunts. I like the idea of the silhouettes because they are easily broken down to transport them. More in a bucket that don't take much room.
They worked for me, maybe they will for you.
Bob
__________________
Old Ironworkers never die, they just rust away - Bob Harrington
Here's the diagram from the SEP, 1936 Popular Science magazine from which I made all my silhouettes and "3-D" decoys; all of scrap 1/4 " plywood. Cheap. They work. Not as handy or light as the stacking Flambeaus....
If you end up using the wings, recommend you use 3 tiny dowels placed from one wing to the other, through the body to strengthen them. With reasonable care, they will never break (they have not).
Paint: cheapest flat black I can find at Wally-Mart.
I like it. Actually, that's also a pretty good design for 1/4" plywood--if you had a band saw. I borrowed one to cut all of my shapes, three layers thick. You could easily rip the slots on a table saw.
Nice "feet" too.
__________________
"Arms are the only true badges of liberty. The possession of arms is the distinction of a free man from a slave." -- Andrew Fletcher 1698
Eventually, I hope to make some from plywood. Lack of the power tools and wood have kept me from doing that. So for now, the razor knife and cardboard are my preferred materials.
Bob
__________________
Old Ironworkers never die, they just rust away - Bob Harrington
Eventually, I hope to make some from plywood. Lack of the power tools and wood have kept me from doing that. So for now, the razor knife and cardboard are my preferred materials.
Bob
Wal-Mart's "finest" flat black--always helps.
__________________
"Arms are the only true badges of liberty. The possession of arms is the distinction of a free man from a slave." -- Andrew Fletcher 1698
Yep! Those 98 cent cans do good!!! Used them last year to get the Crow, Fish going strong! Good enough to have a hawk take one from the spread and fly away with it!!
here are a few pics of some decoys i made a long time ago from thin black rubber conveyor belting. when hanging from branches the winged ones move in the breeze & do quite well. of course i have upgraded since then but they did work.
here are a few pics of some decoys i made a long time ago from thin black rubber conveyor belting. when hanging from branches the winged ones move in the breeze & do quite well. of course i have upgraded since then but they did work.
Brilliant!!
Years ago I cut out and colored up starling decoys-they worked too! However; crow decoys in my experience will attract all birds of prey, vultures, black birds of every stripe; blue jays, Ravens... pigeons...everything wants to check out the marauding all purpose bird of prey-the crow!
Work has been crazy so I finally had a few hours to go hunting today. I hunt public land and didn't have any decoys or a blind so I was running and gunning. My first stand was about two hundred yards from the parking lot and I splashed the first two that came into the call but missed a third. This is a big deal for me because I struggled my first season ever of crow hunting or any kind of wing shooting for that matter last year only getting one over both seasons. I have gotten a lot better from lots of clays and many days practicing on sparrows, starlings and blackbirds. The entire area was completely over grown so I could not find them in the tall grass to take any picture's and I only had a short morning so I moved on to make another stand down the road. The second stand only one came into the call and he was a frigging mile high so I missed it and the rest of them bugged out, smart birds =hard to hunt. I was out of time and had to go but I am rejuvenated to know I can actually knock them out of the sky, I was having my doubts after last season. Butt, belly, beak, bang really does work.
-- Edited by oldshotty on Wednesday 11th of July 2018 02:43:59 AM
I went out again this morning and made three more stands. First two stands one crow came in each time and missed both as they were luner shots, straight up and high as hell. I put in a full choke and made one more stand down the road. This stand I had about four come into the call and I dropped the lead bird and the others took off. I was unable to recover it for a picture despite my efforts, it fell in some thorny briars and I got scratched up pretty good but still couldn't find it. Funny thing on the last stand the birds that flew away landed about two hundred yards away but wouldn't come back, when I turned on the call they would make a bunch of noise but would not fly back in, smart birds. Also first stand was right after sun up and the coyotes went ape **** when I turned on the call and started barking and howling like crazy.
-- Edited by oldshotty on Sunday 15th of July 2018 03:37:52 PM
I had fun last year and I couldn't hit anything, this year I have got a couple every time I have been out. The full choke and #6 heavy field load really hammer them.
Went out this morning and got two more but could only recover one. I don't think I am shooting any better I really think its all due to the full choke and more powerful shells. I never really figured out lead and I don't lead these crows at all, I just swing through them and shoot for the head and they fold right up. I don't come across many birds when I hunt but if I can get them to come to the call there done.
Went out this morning and got two more but could only recover one. I don't think I am shooting any better I really think its all due to the full choke and more powerful shells. I never really figured out lead and I don't lead these crows at all, I just swing through them and shoot for the head and they fold right up. I don't come across many birds when I hunt but if I can get them to come to the call there done.
The Ithaca Feather weight whatever for me was an incredibly hot shot gun but I was a lousy shot when I owned one-a learning curve. But what you are doing is great. If you are using heavier loads get a "Limb saver" and you won't get sore...I try to use light loads as I get pretty close with one of my other shotguns(I do not own an Ithaca)...so if all you see is one; and get only one-that becomes 100%!!
In my area I'll see a hundred all come over at once and get two-my percentages are pretty poor!
I normally make a couple stands each time I go hunting and call in any where from 2-4 crows per murder. I have been out 7 times and called in maybe 30-40 crows and got 6, so my percentage's aren't that great. I can't find numbers like you are describing;hundreds at a time would be pretty cool but either they don't roost like that around here or I am just not finding them. I hunt public land which is my only option, and really don't think there is anyone else hunting them in my area which is about 8000 acres, a 25 mile stretch of river with woods and fields on either side. The Ithaca is a real shooter, it has a Pachmayr recoil pad and handles great its real light which is why I like it since I walk a lot. I would like to build a blind with some decoys and see if that would bring in more crows, but I normally only have a fews hours here and there to steel away for a hunt.
-- Edited by oldshotty on Monday 30th of July 2018 02:55:20 AM
There was maybe a couple hundred in the trees a distance away but you could see them. I tried one of the calls on Crowbusters to experiment_ I was amazed-they all came at once something I really didn't want. But the bottom line here is I don't see "hundreds of crows"-years ago it is possible I had when it was good in the 70's...but I don't want anyone thinking I see "hundreds of crows"-I have but the area was all impossible due to buildings by virtue making it a "no hunting " zone by law, to say nothing of the panic I could cause shooting at inbound crows to their grouping area...and subsequent law breaking...that day I saw a couple hundred(if that many-no idea) was the last time I saw that many through to the end of the season. Typically I would be sitting drinking coffee in that blind and see or hear a straggling south bound crow where upon I'd call and shoot..however last fall was virtually a waste land...so one "good" day of seeing the crows versus getting that many was all ....as it turned out the crows arrived in force barely before the season ended and in full force after the season ended...here we had extremely unusually warm weather which undoubtedly provided an extra long season for earth worms, amphibians(frogs ) and grasshoppers..so why bother coming down to NH?
Another day last year 50 crows were in the north field (newly expanded) and they all came once...2017 the year I saw a hundred(?) and a return visit yielded two more the following week end...other conditions existed, one of the farmers help at the end of the field cutting down trees (Don't tell the Sierra Club) and while no way could I have troubled him I have always considered that bad public relations....so I left...
anyways on the return home I noted about twenty bandits in the trees above an industrial park and no legal way to shoot at them so I kept boogying on...all the way home I noted almost no crow activity despite the apparent abundance of downed corn..very little of anything else too-very odd!(Water fowl on the river)
Made one quick stand today then got called in to work while I was out hunting. This one makes 7 so far for the year, I should have got more I was shooting like crap.
Its that time of year again and crow season starts in a week. I turkey hunted this spring on some state land that I never drive to because its an hour away versus my normal stomping ground which is only about twenty minutes from my house. Man have I been missing out, this is 12000 acres of some of the most pristine land in the state and there are crows everywhere. I have picked my game up this year also as I waterfowled hunted last year for the first time and along with all the skeet, general plinking and pigeon, starlings and sparrows have practiced a lot, I have become a much better wing shooter. Last year I worked out my shot and choke selection pretty well and picked up a couple new shotguns to boot. My first crow season was two years ago and I got two, last year I got eight so hopefully this year with gaining some experience and the presence of so many more birds hopefully I will be more successful. I also picked up a couple of decoys so I will try making some different stands as well rather than just running and gunning all the time. We will see....
Oldshotty go to advance tech and check out shot size and chokes. Last year I really got into Crows. I started with 5,6s with not much luck. Then I reviewed the advanced techniques and changed my shot to 8s and full choke. I went from 3 birds a box to 15 birds a box. And thats with el cheapos. At $5 a box. Keep us posted.
