[Music]
As lovers of the countryside we like the idea of existing in harmony with our environment,
living sustainably, just leaving footprints, and of course trying to recycle.
In Roy's case he's making good use of a fox he shot last night - waste not want not!
This is part of his master plan to increase his chances of shooting some crows.
One thing that used to be done when calling corvids in was to put a live decoy out.
A lot of old keepers would put out a ferret, some even went to the extent of having an
eagle out, put it out in the field and the crows would come in and mob it and that is
what they did with the ferret as well.
As I haven't got an owl decoy and we wouldn't go to the extent of using a live owl now,
what we are going to do is put the fox out and just see if the crows come in and mob
it.
What I am going to do is set the fox up just out here on the side of us because then if
the crows come over and they are on the flight line then they might just pick up the fox
and just come round and give us a chance of a couple of shots.
So that is the plan.
Whether or not it works is another matter.
For the crows that don't fancy having a go at the vixen, Roy has a few other decoys he's
nicked off Andy.
He's going to have to work with these until he gets some birds on the ground.
We are not in the position I would really like to be in, but all we can do is set this
up and see what results we get.
I am sure Andy would be pulling his hair out seeing what I am about to do, but never mind.
Finally we're ready to go and Roy dons a face mask - an essential bit of kit when tackling
crows.
Corvids are notoriously cunning.
Roy manages to get on to a few, with a couple of pigeons for good measure then remembers
that his Mum has knitted him a face mask so he'd better show willing so not to hurt her
feelings.
No tittering at the back please.
We have probably got about a dozen birds on the ground so far and the fox is working.
I have just got it in a slightly the wrong position I think.
You can hear the crows coming in and they are spotting it because they are calling letting
off an alarm call just warning everybody obviously when they see something like that and where
they are coming in the flight line has shifted a little bit so they are looking directly
down at us so they are not flying over where we have actually got the hide.
I am reluctant to move the fox at the moment because we have got another flight line developing
over on the right hand side.
See how we deal with that.
All respect is now lost for Mr Lupton, apart from that of his mother.
Then he gets too hot and loses the mask, so even his mother hates him.
However, the good news is that the fox is working well especially with the addition
of a pretend kill.
Unfortunately, the mobbing crows are lost behind the big hedge, which is useless for
us.
It is amazing how well that fox is working.
I have moved it over to the hedge row and the crows are coming up that line and circling
it.
Unfortunately the hedge is a little bit too high because they are coming in quite ... oh
...
We wish you a merry Christmas ...
Not again ... Anyway ...
Shall we start again?
Yes, let's ...
Oh dear Roy.
Before we get done for cyber bullying we'd better move on.
As our resident bird expert why not show us the difference between the birds.
With the rook we have got a very bald head.
There is no feathering on top of his cere here or on his throttle down here, under his
beak here.
The main reason is the rooks do a lot of grubbing about and worming when they are out in the
fields.
So it is almost like a vulturine adaption.
Whereas vultures have got a bare face, just a skin face.
The rooks are very similar.
It keeps them clean when they are rootling about in the mud.
Whereas if you look at the crow's face then we are very different.
He has got feathering coming down over his cere and over his nasal openings in there.
I think a much more handsome bird.
So those are the two major differences between rooks and crows.
We've had an OK few hours.
It's not a massive bag - but again, it's not always about that.
The farmer will be happy that Roy's there, keeping the crows on their toes.