I have an electronic call, but have never used it for decoying crows or magpies. I was wondering if anyone had used them before and whether it was successful or a waste of time.
I have used electronic calls for both crows and squirrels. I downloaded them onto my iPhone and play them to attract the squirrels and the crows. Call for the crows is a hawk screeching. The hawk is the arch enemy of crows and they will come from miles around to run the hawk out of their territory. I have used it with great success. The problem with crows is getting them to land in an area near enough for a good shot with an air rifle. They will fly around a lot looking for the hawk but rarely land. The Squirrel Call works excellent it has various distress and anger chatter and will attract a squirrel in a heartbeat.
I killed 135 crows over an electronic caller one weekend. I loaned it to someone and it never came back.
Have seen roost with thousands of crows. They have flight lines coming and going, you can set up under one and kill hundreds a day. Birds in line see others fall and come right to you. When using a caller, crows always send out scouts. Kill them and the rest will come but if you don't get even one scout, no others will show. In a good area with lots of room because you must constantly move a 1/2 mile or so between sets its no trouble for a good shot to do what he's claiming. We use to use dead crows and a live owl for decoys. Go to North West Texas in the winter and you will see all the evidence you will need to know it's true.
I killed 135 crows over an electronic caller one weekend. I loaned it to someone and it never came back.