Spring Snows

[calling4life]

To early to talk about these????

First I would like to know, lets say I have $650 total for decoys and I have 0 right now.

Option 1:4 dozen T&T shells, with 100 wind tamer texas rags.
Option 2: 20 dozen economy sillosocks.
Option 3:Maybe all wind tamer texas rags, which would be like 900.

The T&T shells, well not having the numbers are realistic enough not to draw any negative attention, the birds can focus on them and because of their realism still finish well (hopefully)

I worry: 240 sillosocks really isn't many, so birds floating over these may not finish well, having seen plenty of huge spreads of these, their small size not helping. But the heads, and fullbody being more realistic than rags.

Wind Tamer Rags, I have hear the regular texas rags are a waste, they tear and don't look good. These are suppose to stay full in no wind, they are twice as think, and wont rattle in a 30mph wind. 900 is a big number, but are they so unrealistic geese wont finish???

Lets assume I would be on the X, so the geese would naturally be traveling to me, is it wise to go with the realism of the T&T shells, to finish those birds, or which option would you chose???

If you want to take a stab at answering that, I would appreciate it.
Then lets hear what you run, for decoys, callers, if you run flyers etc...

[mallard stomper]

I would check out Deadly Decoys too. They would go good with the sillosocks

[calling4life]

To expensive for a windsock and for my situation. $650 would only buy like 8 dozen ish of them.

[mallard stomper]

You can buy more than 8 dozen dekes if you just run sillosocks and throw a dozen sentry sillo socks in the swing

[calling4life]

$100 a dozen for deadlies so it would actually be about 7 dozen deadlies.
mixing econo sillos and deadly sentry decoys, 17 doz. sillos and 1 doz. deadly, or 14 doz. sillos and 2 dozen deadly sentries. Gotta take 3 doz. sillos off for every 1 doz. deadlies because of their cost.


Also for anyone, lets hear what you run.

[GooseSlayer8]

Here is what i have to say, and by no means am i a snow goose huntin expert but they are my most favorite bird to hunt these days and i have spent a lot of time studying and trying to figure these freakin birds out, Now for my rig im running about 700 texas rags the thin ones u were talkin about, 40 shells, 2 dozen sillos and a dozen GHG fullbodies, the rags are not the best u r correct but for a college kid that just wants to have something to hunt over they are what they are. If i were you and i know u said u only have 650 and well realism is key but numbers are jey as well when ur not hunting the X i mean ask urself if ur huntin a canada goose field they are feeding in u could go out with say a dozen decoys and kill a limit but if u are hunting a field they are just passing by more decoys is the way to go. If i were u i would go with the 4 dozen T&T shells and then the rags, the shells look just as good as the fullbodies and will no doubt be a great finisher, but with that spread u will need to make sure to hit the X when u pick ur fields, now here is my question would it be possible u might have buddies willing to chip in 300-400 to help the spread? I mean that alone will or could get you 100 more decoys, and in this form of hunting it comes down to realism and numbers as i said before. And as of an e-caller make ur own make ur own, make ur own! its easy and the way to go i went to walmart bought a toolbox, amp then went to radio shack got speaqkers,wire and everything else and seriously spent 125 tops and this thing sings!!!! Now rememberv this is my opinion and my situation for my area i wish u the best of luck and hope ya slay em this spring none the least, if ya need any pics of the e-caller, decoys anything give me a shout or any help what so ever just ask.

[mallard stomper]

$100 a dozen for deadlies so it would actually be about 7 dozen deadlies.
mixing econo sillos and deadly sentry decoys, 17 doz. sillos and 1 doz. deadly, or 14 doz. sillos and 2 dozen deadly sentries. Gotta take 3 doz. sillos off for every 1 doz. deadlies because of their cost.


Also for anyone, lets hear what you run.
I wasnt talking about deadlies this time. SENTRY sillosocks. they are $65.00 a dozen so you would be able to put more sentries in the swing
http://www.sillosocks.com/Shopping.asp?CategoryId=74

[bck1006]

If you can try and get the T&T shells. They are a better decoy. We ran 50 dozen last year with no problems. You will still need some "fillers" and do that with some northwinds or silo socks. You also may want to look into getting some of the hot buy snow shells they are a little cheaper.If it came down to it, the silosocks are the next best thing The rags are the worst thing you can use!! .They are loud they tend to blow off the the rods in high winds and they just look fake. They key is not always about #'s but about scouting and location. You can kill birds with less than 10 dozen decoys if you do you homework and take the time and scout the area out where you want to hunt for about 3 days or so before hunting. You really want to be out there right before dark if you find geese and find where they leave from and they will return to the same spot in the morning unless a strong front moves in. You also want to make sure that you watch where in they field they are at as well. I hope that helps you out

[duckhunter101]

ebay get bunch you will get em preaty cheap

[calling4life]

WOW gentleman, I appreciate it, a lot. :D Keep it coming.

Brian, I hear what you say about the rags, now my question is, have you tried the wind tamer ones????

These are suppose to take a 30mph wind with no noise, and I will be using the bigger steel sillosock stakes with them, zip tying and gluing these into place on the stake so they don't move.

I ask about these rags because if I went with these and the T&T shells I would have 148 total decoys, if I went with sillosocks and the T&T shells I would only have 72 decoys.

And the $650 is actually with another buddy coming in on price, we aren't snow goose hunters, we don't ever see them here in the fall, and this would be his first trip ever out spring hunting, and only my second.

So first year going, hesitant to waste money, not knowing what to expect etc... Now I know where to go, and it's a great area that stages birds, so hitting the X will not be a problem for us. We also have a few waterholes we could hunt the edge of, it wont kick the birds out because they have other water to go to. Getting permission here was also extremely easy.

We will be making an e-caller and possibly a few vortexs, if we have the space to haul them. The vortexs and the e- caller should really help draw birds, as long as they are made correctly.

[bck1006]

WOW gentleman, I appreciate it, a lot. :D Keep it coming.

Brian, I hear what you say about the rags, now my question is, have you tried the wind tamer ones????

These are suppose to take a 30mph wind with no noise, and I will be using the bigger steel sillosock stakes with them, zip tying and gluing these into place on the stake so they don't move.

I ask about these rags because if I went with these and the T&T shells I would have 148 total decoys, if I went with sillosocks and the T&T shells I would only have 72 decoys.

And the $650 is actually with another buddy coming in on price, we aren't snow goose hunters, we don't ever see them here in the fall, and this would be his first trip ever out spring hunting, and only my second.

So first year going, hesitant to waste money, not knowing what to expect etc... Now I know where to go, and it's a great area that stages birds, so hitting the X will not be a problem for us. We also have a few waterholes we could hunt the edge of, it wont kick the birds out because they have other water to go to. Getting permission here was also extremely easy.

We will be making an e-caller and possibly a few vortexs, if we have the space to haul them. The vortexs and the e- caller should really help draw birds, as long as they are made correctly.

The wind tamers don't have as much noise but still to much.

Also what do you consider a great staging area? Also the vortex machines are great but since this is your 1st year I would just stick with the basics and focus more on your caller and decoys. If you want more info pm me your # and we can talk

[hammerdown04]

We ran higdon shells last year, practically the same as the TNT shells and you can get them for a fraction of the cost right now. The standard shells on ebay are going for $25 a dozen :shock: Get 4 dozen of those and the rest sillosocks...

[calling4life]

You're right, what I consider a great staging area may not be to others.

600,000 plus birds in our area we were hunting, but it wasn't just one water hole they would sit at, there are a few in the area. Which I think is great, because there is also water they use during the day, and we could set up for a few water hunts as well.

Other more experienced snow hunters in the group said at the peak on our trip we had close to 1 million, it was a 10 day trip. Now this past spring was my first spring snow experience, so seeing this many birds was new to me. Attempting to count and actually see how many birds there were doesn't sound fun.

We had a couple days where we had 1500 sillosocks out, with a total of 30 ish birds for both days. We then tried five to six hundred sillosocks, with very minimal luck. Hunting on the X, and exactly where the birds took off from the night before. We had I think 3 e callers, 9 speakers.

So seeing the results that that massive of a spread got, I am not excited about making or trying to buy a bunch of sillosocks, and is why I wanted to try these T&T shells.

More mellow, but realistic, also why I thought the vortexs would be great play. This being my second, but my buddies 1st spring, again, mellow is good, as we are poor.

[ted b]

We run silosocks and siloflyers around 80dz and been avg 45 birds a hunt out here in the east with 4 guns...For money go with the silosocks and then you can always add to later remenber with shells or even fullbodies springs snows equal wet muddie fields so unless you can get a big otter sled your carrying the stuff into field because you may not even get 4 wheeler in at some times good luck..

Ps dont forget you have store all these decoys also....ted

[tornadochaser]

go with the silosocks, build a quality e caller, and hit the backside of the migration. my buddies that are in grad school or work part time were putting the hurt on em in south dakota right up to the end of the season. their last 4 hunts consisted of less than 12 dozen sillosocks. gotta love the juvies!

[SamnTuck]

NY isn't known for snows, but apparently there's a good sized lake a few hours west of me that's covered with snows in the spring. A non-hunter buddy of mine lives on a farm out there and said that his fields had a bunch of "those white geese" last spring. I'd love to try to hunt some, but really don't want to spend too much money on snows decoys, simply because the season here is only a couple weeks. How effective is putting out a big canada/snow mixed spread?

[rooster]

Samntuck.....I live very very close to that big lake to the west of you that is covered in those "white geese". Keep that under you hat please...... LOL. Just kiddin we have tried for three years to hunt the snows with a big Canada spread (10 doz full bodies) and about 10 dozen assorted snow decoys. We have had very limited success. So to answer your question I would not waste alot of time with the canada decoys for snows. I think the real problem we have is that we are not allowed to use e-callers in our state and the season closes March 10th every year and all the geese show up march 12th . I have emailed fish and wildlife and the NY DEC who stated thay are trying to get the ness. waiver to hunt migratory birds after march 10 in New York but we will see.

[Take'em7]

Get enough money for a guided trip. Seeing as how you're pretty new to this game maybe a guided trip will show you exactly how to kill them. Then next year you mimic what they did and wowza. Dead snows everywhere.