$250 budget for first goose decoys

I would skip the silos. They are hard to get into frozen ground and have some glare. I would go with a dozen fullbodies. Check out the Nodak outdoors store. Higdon Fullbodies are comparable to Bigfoots. www.prowaterfowl.com also had a very good price for a dozen higdon fullbodies. Also look into Higdon Stackables (adds tons of motion), G&H shells (my personal favorite), Bigfoots (my personal favorite) or possibly Avery products. I just don't buy Avery cause they manufacture their products in China, and I prefer to buy American (Just My opinion here guys). We have 1 dozen G&H standard shells, 1/2 G&H Supermags, 1 dozen Herters shells, and 8 Bigfoots. I would also recommend buying flocked or flocking to do your own heads. All of our decoys have flocked heads and I was blown away by how good they looked.

Thanks for the advice. I thought about just getting a dozen full bodies, but wondered if this would be enough or not. I think it probably will be since the areas I hunt are not pressured. Any other advice is more than welcome.

try going to your local wal-mart in the spring, in the garden section they ussually have them , we pay 20 bucks apiece for them (taxes in) down here . They are identical to carrylites body wise but the colors are off but for the price of a little bit of paint you can have some half decent looking dekes

I would tr getting some good looking shell dekes.in my 15 years expereance they work just as well.for that kind of money u can get 3 doz. try G&H I think there the best for youre money and there made in america. Just my opinion
:wink:

Its me again. hey mcn22 u have to realize that some people here hunt only with full bodies. Theres nothing wrong with that but its not nessisary. I dont care how heavely hunted an area is shells R just as efective. as for silos u should always have some out. When the birds are circling they see those siloes dissapear and reapear thus adding movement to youre spread without the expencive and unneeded aid of electronics. Not to mention there are non glare siloes on the market. Also its pretty easy and inexpensive [and rewarding] to make yur own siloes. Dont get me wrong, full bodies are nice i have some but unless your independently whealthy you dont need to make them your whole spread.

You may be right about the not getting fullbodies. I don't want to spend my whole budjet and only end up with 10 or 12 deeks. My original idea, a mix of shells and silos, is sounding like a good start. Still not sure though. I think that I may need some floaters as well. This weekend I will be going to a Cabela's in Kansas City. Hopefully I can decide by then.

Did you buy any decoys yet? just curious.

Yep. I picked up a box of the GHG fullbodies and also a box of Real Geese Pro Series Silos. I won't be hunting any areas that are heavily pressured, so I figured I might be OK with less deeks. In the process, I also ended up spending a little more to get good quality products since I figure they will last quite a while. The full bodies just looked too good to pass up. Now I just need to figure out a cheap way to add more numbers to my spread since I only have 18. Maybe some cheap shells or something?

Good choice. It is better to go with the best decoys and then add as you go. It is worse to pay too little than too much. You might try some home made siloettes painted flat black. I think Outdoor Life had an article about it in Sept.

Good luck hunting!

From my experience hunting, homemade silos just scare away geese. www.tru-tonecalls.com go there and they have some really nice silos. Soon they will be offering silos already flocked. good luck

Are these as good as the real geese pro series? I know it says no shine, but do they absorb the light as well? The price is really good and if they work as well as the real geese I may have to get some.

The Big Flock decoys are not no shine, they sent me some to test out last year and I was not very happy with the Big Flocks. I actually even sent back the dekes they sent me and told them I dont want them.

In Cabela's Fall 2004 annual catalog it has Canada Texas rag decoys. 50 of them for $19.99. So 40 bucks for 100 more decoys that are light, non-reflextive give motion to spread.

That is a no, no. You use texas rags for snow geesn not Canada Geese.

Not sure I agree totally with the No No stance. Last year we added about 20 Canada rags to 4 doz shells and the movement had em landing in the dekes. We've played with various amounts since, based on the size of the spread we are going for and have limited out more often than not. I think that if used very sparingly as filler, movement decoys they can be very effective. I would not, however use them as my main spread.