The X24 is a great call. I take possession of my old man’s when he’s not using it lol. I think it’s certainly one of the most cost-effective options on the market, but perhaps a little bit cheaper one might be a little more suited for this particular fella before he splurges on a 400$ call. Something like the Hijack (or even Patriot) might potentially be a little bit more suitable for his purposes for now. Otherwise, this is all pretty great advice. Just my opinion.
Well... it's all about the clarity and fidelity of the call and it's playback. (AND! the Clarity and BitRate of the sound recording!)
When I started? Just had an ICOTec G300. Was trying to be Timid and just dip a toe into that water. The Fidelity on that one was really poor.
Later on? tried the Johnny Stewart Grim Speaker 2. Which ARGH!!! It's a unit with a lot of potential... if their company just took two seconds to show it some love in R&D. You can even load-in your own sound files into that one! But the remote was hit-or-miss frustrating sometimes. And issues with Quality Control (had a screw somehow come loose INSIDE their unit? they are two press-fit together halves. Had to have them send me a new one. ) It was... a significant step-up from the ICOTec G300, and really had a lot of potential, for somebody like myself who's tech-savvy enough. BUT.. the frustration you feel, in the field, when you're trying to invoke something on a remote and it's not happening when you need it to happen? Is infuriating!
Also DO NOT get a unit that doesn't run off a rechargeable battery. They have ones that run of AA's but for the safety of the device, and to ensure cold doesn't affect it, and that it won't splooge inside the device ruining it when Heat gets up there, ya gotta do Lithium AA's. And stocking-up with Lithium's gets pricey fast.
With the X24, though it "stings" to buy it as an entrypoint... the difference in effectiveness (as long as YOU aren't screwing it up by something you forgot on how you setup the sit spot for calling them in, etc) is like night-and-day!
I mean.. ya go from something that sounds like talking over two tin-cans tied with a string... to something that your human ears cannot tell any difference if the recording material is well made and of a high bitrate encoding like 256Kbps or 320Kbps, for MP3 format, for example.
ANOTHER IMPORTANT THING!!! Keep in mind when stuffing your Caller and Remote into your pack when loading-up at home... make DANG WELL SURE... that it's NOT POSSIBLE for the buttons or switches on the remote to be accidentally turned-on by something pushing upon it when it's within your pack en route during the drive to get there! AND ON THIS TOPIC... you need to ALWAYS... ALWAYS make sure to AT LEAST have a few hand-calls with ya, just in case something like this ever happens, so ya didn't just waste all that Gas Money for nothing!
For a real Ultra-Portable setup? Go checkout the
https://pocketprey.com/ ! Their device runs "a dang long time" off a single 9V battery.
They now have another model that now has like Fawn distress and some other kind of sound on it.<thumbs Up!>
Just be ready though! Things are more intense since you're holding the lil box making the calling sound! Which means they're going to be heading-in to wherever YOU are! So ya gotta keep your eyes peeled to detect when they are entering the perimeter at a distance away.. then as they are approaching, you have to remember to do your moving of limbs when their eyes go behind something like a tree/brush.
And I actually also use their PocketPrey Rabbit distress sometimes to help coax CottonTails into my sit area. I was actually on a sit for coyotes with it one time, and I'd shoved myself backup into this sorta "hedge" of little scrub-oak like small bushes, and at a certain point... I realize a very young one, has climbed up and into the bush like one or two away from me! So steenking cute up close
I'll attach a picture of a yote I took using the PocketPrey, so you can see how small it is. It's about the same size as the box of .223 Rem.
