Record Day Hunting NH Crows - Parker Style

[Frank Cronin]

I took a couple of days off from work to go up to the "Live Free or Die" state to team up with Scott Kittredge to do a little crow busting. At first light we were all set up in the blind, loaded our Parkers, and got both our electronic callers going. Within minutes a nice bunch of crows flew in from their roost in the distance and we downed several of them. After a couple hours at this blind, Scott wasn't satisfied with the wind direction and the obstruction from the tall trees above, so we packed up our gear and went to the other side of the cornfield. Our total at this blind was 23.

After set up at the second blind and our electronic callers blaring the crow owl fight, these crows started to fly in. And do I mean really coming in... It was a blitz of black birds non-stop. In the beginning, the high flying migrant crows were out of range but a few did come down to see what all the racket was about. We could see way out in the distance about a mile away groups of 25 and 30 a line of crows. The onslaught just would not stop. They were so many crows coming in so fast, we literally couldn't load our guns quick enough.

The most memorable was during a time when things got quiet for about 15-20 minutes so I decided to use the idle time between shoots to clean up the pile of shells I ejected with my DHE. Since my back was turned and with two callers cranked full blast – Scott was trying to tell me to turn around but I couldn’t hear him. After several attempts to get my attention, Scott decided to touch off a couple of rounds and I frantically spun around. Up in the sky there had to be at least a couple hundred crows. It was absolutely amazing.

Around 11:30AM we ran out of shells! So we quickly went back to the truck to get more ammo and we changed guns. I switched my DHE 12 ga to my GH 12ga. Scott switched his 20 ga. VH to his straight gripped BH 12 gauge.

By days end at 3:30 we downed 180 crows including one rare white crow. Scott got 91 crows with 173 shells fired. I shot 89 with 169 shells fired.

Scott said he has never had a shoot like this nor has he ever seen this many crows in a single day. Scott has been hunting crows since 1974. We approximated that we saw 800 to 1000 crows in flight yesterday.

It was a RECORD day and the Parkers performed flawlessly.

[charlie cleveland]

what a hunt it must have been...i sure like to hear of these kinda hunts and a record breaker wow....nice guns in the pictures it looks like you boys no what your doing by the proof on the ground..and your ratio of shell to bird was really good to....hope ya ll have more of these good hunts... charlie

[David Lien]

You will both be blessed,and some one, somewhere, will have more ducks...,
Thanks David

[John Dallas]

Not sure what my old English teacher would call the collective form of "crows" (like a flock of geese or a herd of buffalo) but I believe a bunch of crows are called a Murder of crows.

[Stephen Hodges]

Thats great guys:bowdown: I thought I could hear you shooting all the way up here in Gilford:rotf:

[Paul Plager]

Man o man, it looks like they were just falling out of the sky. Nice job guys! Thanks for the pics. That was realy cool:shock:

[Thomas L. Benson Sr.]

Good shooting fellas: I have never shot a crow and was curious to the reason that you do shoot crows.We get thousands through here in the winter and what is the set up you use to decoy them in.Thanks Thomas

[scott kittredge]

what a hunt it must have been...i sure like to hear of these kinda hunts and a record breaker wow....nice guns in the pictures it looks like you boys no what your doing by the proof on the ground..and your ratio of shell to bird was really good to....hope ya ll have more of these good hunts... charlie

thanks Charlie, Frank is just picking up on crow hunting, he picked it up fast ! had to with all the shooting we did. best day ever was 104 with Pete Lester. now with the new record it will be another 40 years before i can top that one. its good to have somebody to shoot with that could see all we saw that day. Frank's bird count was off a little, there were between 3 to 3 1/2 thousand birds that went by use that day. long lines at times where i couldn't even see the end. at one point we had a couple hundred over us and a line back to where they came from that i couldn't see the end of it.:shock: i just started laughing and said, Frank we don't have enough shells!! scott

[Stephen Hodges]

Hey Scott, where is Lester?? Did all the crows scare him off:rotf:

[Pete Lester]

Hey Scott, where is Lester?? Did all the crows scare him off:rotf:

Had to work till Noon and rather than interrupt the fun I set up in another field several miles away. Birds were still moving in the afternoon but not like they had been in the morning from the sounds of it. I took measley 37 with 56 shots. How many crows have you shot this fall Steve?

PS. Frank, Blue Jeans? Crows have color vision, camo pants in the future buddy the leaves are falling fast leaving little cover.

[scott kittredge]

Hey Scott, where is Lester?? Did all the crows scare him off:rotf:

he was invited but he said ,"wouldn't be enough shooting for him:nono:" the pants work fine, killed most ever on a hunt, with a good teacher and blind builder we could have dressed in hot pink :shock:( not me . Frank) scott

[Stephen Hodges]

he was invited but he said ,"wouldn't be enough shooting for him:nono:" the pants work fine, killed most ever on a hunt, with a good teacher and blind builder we could have dressed in hot pink :shock:( not me . Frank) scott

Now hot pink would look good on either of you guys:eek:

[charlie cleveland]

what kind of devise would you boys recommend to use on those crows...be sides a mouth call.... charlie

[Destry L. Hoffard]

No pic of the white crow? Now that I'd like to see! I chased a partial albino crow around for about a year but never could get a shot. He was a town bird so I was limited to an air rifle.....

Destry

[scott kittredge]

No pic of the white crow? Now that I'd like to see! I chased a partial albino crow around for about a year but never could get a shot. He was a town bird so I was limited to an air rifle.....

Destry

Destry, the crow had about 45% white wing feathers,( seen in pics) i shot one last year and have only seen a pic of another one. frank shot the 2nd one i have seen:bowdown:. scott

[Pete Lester]

what kind of devise would you boys recommend to use on those crows...be sides a mouth call.... charlie

Charlie the most important thing you need in this order; quality of recorded sounds, reproduction of those sounds, player battery life.

Johnny Stewart brand sounds are hands down the best, particularly Crows fighting with Owl, Death Cry of a Crow, Crow Come Here and Single Excited Crow.

The current technology is digital, the dominant brand is Foxpro. Their units range from $250 to $1000. All but the most expensive digital units are designed for predator hunting, battery life is too short for serious crow hunting and sound reproduction is not as good as using a remote horn style speaker. The older technology, portable cassette players like the Johnny Stewart 612 and 512 along with units like the Lohman 2000 offer the best performance for the money. Although out of production, lightly used and like new units can be found on Ebay and they sell for $35 to $100 bucks. Most will need new batteries, they used sealed lead acid alarm system batteries that can be found at any electrical supply store for about $15. They are easy to install. Cassette tapes are getting harder to find but again careful watching of Ebay will result in success. I record my own tapes from a Johnny Stewart Crow CD.

The sealed lead acid batteries in these cassette players can run up to 20 hours on a charge. The digital units can't come close to that amount of play time as they use AA batteries.

[charlie cleveland]

thanks pete.. will keep out an eye on ebay for this stuff... charlie