Well, if you call one bird taken...success. I was happy with it.
Yesterday afternoon I did the impossible. I army man crawled into the middle of a cattle pasture to within range of a small group Sandhill Cranes and picked off one bird when they finally made me out. I could have used one of those stalking cow decoys. There were black cows in the field and the Cranes really paid them no attention. Blaze was just a spectator from a distance. The field behind me in the picture is where the birds were.



Note the dirt on me from the crawl. And the stickers on my arm. This was a painful stalk as all those stickers were poking me through the jacket during my crawl. Even my head net was covered with them. I just moved slow with several pauses. When ever the birds were distracted from wind gusts and passing vehicles I moved the fastest.



My friend SteveTexas came out later for some hog hunting. I tried to needle a .223 round from my retro AR15/M16 look alike through about 50 yards of brush for a headshot on one hog, but it got deflected. No hogs taken by either of us. Finished up with some Wild Turkey around the fire and venison smoked sausage on the mesquite grill. After this picture, my camera on/off button crapped out on me and I had left my backup at home.



Morning plan was to put out my spread of 23 Silhouette Crane decoys and for confidence, a half a dozen feeder Higdon motion decoys. With a little Wild Turkey keeping me warm I got them piled in the field last night so they would already be out there for this morning. Steve had work to do on the other side of the lease, but late morning he was to jump any cranes on the back field which from past patterning would normally send them to the field I was in. This morning before sun up I set up my decoys around an area of sheet water in the field, dug a pit for my layout and grassed it. With the Camera broke I took this with my cell phone.



At first light I was covered in ducks buzzing that sheet water. At sun up I was covered in Dove. And I bet I saw 150 Crows fly over me. First flight of Cranes had three birds. I was asleep, but they were very vocal waking me up with them about 40 yards up over my right shoulder. They were dipping and turning. I was sure they would commit so I did not move. Instead they turned again and away they went. It was only then I noticed the frost on my decoys melting and making them shine something awful. I should have taken the shot. Next group was again three birds. They had flown the treetops across the field and turned into the field straight for me. But again the shine. They turned at about 100 yards out. Last flight of the morning was just a pair. My decoys had dried by then and I hit the first bird which circled as crippled with the other bird still following. But it eventually recovered and they flew higher and higher until both were just dots in the distance. I left the field and got with Steve 'who had overslept' and we both made a stalk to intercept the Cranes in our back field, but they took flight just before we got in position.

Crane season ends tomorrow and I have to go to work. Really surprised we had Cranes at all. The only thing to attract them was some pockets of sheet water to loaf on since there was no wheat planted. Oh well, maybe next year they will be back again.

Yummy. Crane meat is like filet mignon to me.

nice going John! gotta love the low crawling to get yer bird

NIce,

Always enjoy the pics and posts!

Congrats:Are you N/W of Wilson ?

nice read john. stalking like that is tough work.

Did you try the call?

How are those things eatin' wise?

First a big public thank you to Mark. He sent me his Hadels Crane call to try out.

Mark,
On an earlier Deer hunting trip, I had some small groups of cranes just hovering around mid day. At camp when one of those groups came over low enough to hear me, I ran and got that call out which gave me a chance to try it different ways to get as close to the real thing as I could. With a friend watching I actually did pull a group over to camp and had them circle use a couple times. I turned them from silent to being vocal with me.

On this recent hunt I had the call and that time I did not get much luck in turning the birds not already coming to the decoys. But it was the end of season and some spooky birds.


As good as everyone keeps saying they are.

jOHN, i found a new nickname for you

SNIPER JOHN CRANE instead of wayne

The Ole Ribeye in the Sky

Nice read as always John.