best type of hand call on the market?

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Let me state that I do not wish to get in a heated debate on this subject but some of these statements do not make sense to me. So many times when I see guys reccommending calls there seems to be an overwelming amount of guys reccommending custom calls over production ones but the reasoning behind their choices simply are not justified.
Granted we have many talented custom builders on this sight and most do sound good but "sound better"? How? Most closed reeds all use the same voices. While materials do make a slight difference in sound I believe some of this is perception rather than reality. "They are easier to blow"...same here. Those are broad statements that seem to have to factual base.
Open reeds are essencially the same however there does seem to be a little more variation between call makers. Please express your thoughts further. While I do appreciate fine looking calls for the most part they are tools to me and I would rather have a tool that would get the job done and spend the rest on a box of shells.
As a call manufacture I sincerely would like to know why some are of this opinion.
THANKS



You are right with the closed reed calls being pretty similar sounding. There isn't much you can do with the same reed. But the open reeds are a different story. A lot of the custom call builders custom tune the boards to the call/caller. I've owned quite a few production calls and then got a few custom calls and there is just no comparison in the quality, beauty and sound. That being said I have probably called in the same amount of coyotes with both the production calls and custom. So to each his own. I just like the custom calls more.
 
For open reed, I like the Primos Lil-Dog set. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif They will make any sound you want to make. Bird sounds, rabbit distress, fawn distress, pup whines, howls, and barks.
For closed reed, I like the Haydels BR-84 baby rabbit.
 
Quote:
Let me state that I do not wish to get in a heated debate on this subject but some of these statements do not make sense to me. So many times when I see guys reccommending calls there seems to be an overwelming amount of guys reccommending custom calls over production ones but the reasoning behind their choices simply are not justified.
Granted we have many talented custom builders on this sight and most do sound good but "sound better"? How? Most closed reeds all use the same voices. While materials do make a slight difference in sound I believe some of this is perception rather than reality. "They are easier to blow"...same here. Those are broad statements that seem to have to factual base.
Open reeds are essencially the same however there does seem to be a little more variation between call makers. Please express your thoughts further. While I do appreciate fine looking calls for the most part they are tools to me and I would rather have a tool that would get the job done and spend the rest on a box of shells.
As a call manufacture I sincerely would like to know why some are of this opinion.
THANKS



I'll be up front with you Rod. Always have and always will.

I'll agree with you for the most part on the enclosed reed calls with the exception of this one little question. When mass producing calls, how many manufacturers actually take the time to tune (blade, tweak, sand, etc) each and every reed rather than pick one out of the box and shove it in the call? I have had a few production calls and several custom calls that look awesome but were what I call flat or monotone. Very hard to get any emotion out of it no matter how you blew it. No variation in pitch.

As far as open reeds go, some just blow easier than other. Example: The red desert howler and primos hot dog. Both have large air channels , require an enormous mount of air and are more difficult for beginners to learn on. Some open reed distress calls that I have received from a couple of custom call makers as well as production calls I have had over the years suffer from this same problem. Other things are tone board design, reed shape and thickness, air channel width, depth, and back pressure from the barrel.

I do not agree that all custom calls are better than their production counter part either. I have had production and custom calls that I flat out don't like for one reason or another. Could be sound, requires alot of air, or just difficulty to use. But again, these are only my opinions and aren't worth much. Just personal preferance i guess. I've talked calls with you some and you have asked me on occasion what I thought about this or that, and I have always given you a straight forward answer and I hope were ok with that as I suspect we are.

In the end, they all will call coyotes. I believe it has more to do with the location, set up, and right place at the right time more so than the actual sound.
 
Crapshoot-- No need to apologize for anything. Your thoughts are a fair assumption and thats what I asked for. I understand and for the most part agree. As you stated "I do not agree that all custom calls are better than their production counter part either" is the point or should I say question I was asking. I quess it's personal choice but just because it's a production call does not neccesarily mean it's not worth taking a look at....Mine or others for that matter. Some production call can be easy to blow...being open or closed reeded. By the way we do take the time to blade and blow our closed reeds. Many reeds are sometimes simply thrown in the trash too. No hard feelings here friend!
 
back in the 80's my best call was a Haydel Goverment cottontail got me several bobcat's and coyote's back then.love the Raspy sound. i alway's wondered how the big company's would feel about us custom call maker's taking there bussiness. havnt heard any thing yet. this is a bussiness for me i have a bussiness Liscense and i pay tax's. i tried the retail thing. spent several thousand didnt go over well. i think there are some great retail call's out there and yes not all custom call's are better. i use to have a huge collection. but i would get alot of call's that did not sound well at all. i would never try to send a call out unless it sounded good. there are alot of great retail call's out there. it's all in how easy, sound and price alot of time's. not every one has over $30.00 buck's to spend on call's. and like Crapshoot said number one is the stand. and how you set up. and yes you could call a coyote with any call it is how you put your feeling's in to it. so buy what feel's right and go kill some coyote's. Rick
 
I know a certain custom call maker that shall remain nameless that doesn't go calling without a Haydel's Government Hunter on his lanyard. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif I've got quite a few production calls and use them too.
 
Thanks Rick good to see you here! I forgot to tell you to that after you gave me one of your calls I called in a double. Only got one though. It was the moose antlered call!
 
Weasel- Guess we were typing at the same time. LOL Yeah I have been known to try a few different calls out myself....RESEARCH or FIELD TESTING HA! to some it's just hunting! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
I was one of the one who made several "broad" statements regarding production calls, so Ill address the issue to best of my ability. I am not technical enough about what makes a call blow the way I like it to articulate why it does what it does. I do have several production/semi-production calls that I like very much. I am sure there are production calls out there that I would like the sound of as well as my custom calls. The only custom calls I have ever blown were the 5 Carver calls I bought. I don't know what makes them easy to blow and require very little air, but they are. The Primos "Double Whammy" and the "Little Dog" are also easy to blow and sound darn good, but I still like the custom calls a fair bit better. I also think the Savage is an amazing weapon. Shoots as good or better out of the box than many guns costing 40% more, but I would still rather hunt with my Browning that I piller and glass beded myself. Some guys look at guns as tools, I consider them friends. Same with calls.

Its just personal preference. I like a cool looking call that sounds great and is easy to blow. Not to take anything away from the great production calls that are out there. I suspect I would like the production calls that the gentleman from Louisiana makes too, just never tried one. I was just rendering an opinion and granted not a real educated one at that. I am just starting to realize that there are tons of calls out there I never knew about cause they are not in the retail stores.
 
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Hand's down open reed: Verminator calls, closed reed: sceery, Howlers: verminator or dan thompson red desert. That's what is on my #1 lanyard!!
 



I am just extremely impressed with the Carver calls. They are beautiful and sound amazing. Not to take anything away from the other calls, many of which I am not familiar with.
 
well rod i don't know about everyone elses opinion but when i go out i always have your goverment trapper cottentail a tally hoe and a cercie mvp-3 even when i plan on useing one of my custom calls or electronic call to me its faith in the call more than anything else.
i love the sound of my custom calls too but haven't had them for twenty years like the tally,critter,and other calls for the tried and true testing that i've ran your call threw.
customs work great too and are so fine looking my wife lets me display them in the living room i love them all.
can't help it i'm a call-a-holic
i even bought a foxpro the other day even though i prefer my hand calls. sometimes electronic calling is needed for a situation. now i have 4 e-callers around 100 predator calls and 40 to 50 elk and deer calls. yep i'm a call addict
 
Spot/stalking; I would use lip-squeeks[or a rodent squeeker], especially out on the open hills. Specifically, if you see one laying/sitting out a 1/4 mile away or so. Coyotes, hear extremely well from afar.

I hunt central Iowa, mostly open rolling hilled cropland, with very little cover. Et the local coyotes, tend NOT to come close. The ones that do respond. Tend to HUG the cover they came out from. Or they'll hang-up, lope by, or view the direction your call noise came from. From far away.

Some coyotes, you will eventually note. Are/will be disinterested.
 
I have two bags of calls and howlers.

For a beginner a closed reed call is much easier to use. I have taught many beginners.

It is a shame that we can no longer get the Weems Duo-Tone wooden barrel call. This call was very special in that it worked on all varmints, deer, pigs, elk, and bears. It had the additional feature of being very easy to teach a beginner to blow.

Russ, in the late 70's and through out the 80's and 90's, I carried a lot of new people varmint hunting. I had easy access to high populations of yotes, and I loved to hand the new guy a call and make him sit down and imitate me on the stand. If there was a new guy on the trip, I did not take an electronic call. When a guy uses a hand call successfully for the first time, it is a day that will stay with him forever. It was amazing the newbie's reaction on the first coyotes that they called in. The new guys have always had trouble with the open reed calls, always.

One of the very best calls that I have ever used is the Cierce Lohman MVP-3 which is an adjustable plastic call that will go from a mouse squeek to a very coarse gravley call. It is perhaps the call that I would pick over all others if I had to pick just one. The Johnny Stewart PC-1 is another closed reed Non-adjsutable call that is very easy to blow.

Rod, I really don't understand how some of these closed reed calls sound so different, but they do.

The open reed calls are very difficult for a guy that has not blown a duck or turkey call. It is also very difficult for a smoker to blow an open reed call...they give out of wind....heck, I may give out of wind on a long stand.

Howlers are without a doubt the most difficult call to master. Bill Austin had a great instructional tape on howlers. Bill was a no nonsense coyote killer. Too bad he's dead, we lost a great one. It is an injustice to the world of varmint hunting that Bill Austin's tapes are not available to the hunters. That guy understood more about how a coyote thinks than anyone that I have ever met.

Many people that are considering taking up varmint calling think that they have to have an electronic call, we know that is not so. Consider a young man, married or in college, possibly with a young family; the cost of the electronic calls just about puts him out of the sport altogether. I have encountered this time and time again.

Rod, I wish you all the luck in your call making.
 
was bill from Kaycee Wyoming if he was i have that tape somewhere didn't like his calls though the reeds warped i think i still have the barrels. defiantly went into more detail than the average instructional tape
 
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It is an injustice to the world of varmint hunting that Bill Austin's tapes are not available to the hunters

As far as i know they are still available, i have a handfull or more in my collection...
For Red fox i have always liked the Burham Bro.s call the c-3 with the single reed or useing it with a double reed installed. It has a higher pitch than other closed reed calls and the fox seem to like it..
For coyotes i use just about any of them in my collection, very close to all being the same..
For a open reed i like to use the yote buster, wiley-one, and scerry howler. there is a semi open reed call no longer made called the pied-piper that is a great call. There are some calls out there very simuler to it but don't sound the same... I've also been picking up a few custom calls here and there and its about like store bought calls some good ones and some just so-so..
 
Bill Austin's five audio tape instruction course was very good...the audio was poor but with earphones and playing with the volume you could get through them..
 
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