[plumseverywhere]

Every now and again, the afore mentioned person has a 'run in' with his immediate next door neighbour who shoots the crows.... quite entertaining listening to all the shouting and swearing !!!!!!

Life in the countryside can be quite fun !!!!!!!

   reminds me of when we lost our first chicken to the fox, the neighbours told us that the woman who used to own this house actually fed all the foxes all year round - no wonder they are so sure of themselves and saunter round our garden!! 
Mr plums is again stalking the magpies - there are 2 more and I think you are right Roxy, they hear the cackle and know the eggs are there for the taking...

[AengusOg]

, crows have always come in the run for grain which is fine by me.

Crows are flesh/carrion/egg eaters. It's likely to be rooks or jackdaws which come for grain.

Crows are the ones with the heavy black beak, with long feathers around its base. Rooks have a slimmer beak, and have grey/whitish patches at its base. Jackdaws are smaller than the other two species, and have blue eyes and a dark cap on the head.

Although rooks and jackdaws can be costly in terms of the grain they consume, they also do a lot of good as well. Rooks eat a lot of leatherjackets which are harmful to crops. They are also handy for breaking up horse dung in the fields where it is impractable to lift it.

Crows build a nest in a tree isolated from other crows, changing site each season, and hold a territory during the breeding season. Rooks and jackdaws are communal nesters, returning to the same site every year, and radiate from there according to the food sources.

[Womble]

I know it is illegal to keep a wild bird caged, but someone I know had a magpie in their field in a cage.  I asked why, and she said it was a friends, and he had loaned it to them to be bait to catch the magpie eating ther eggs.  It had food and water, and  apparantly was tame.  Supposedly, it encouraged the other magpies to enter the cage next to it ...

That's a Larsen trap as described above, and if used under license, and according to the applicable conditions (checked daily, food and water available at all times for the captive 'call bird' etc), it's perfectly legal. The idea is that because magpies are territorial, if you introduce a stranger (the call bird) into their area, they will try to drive it away, and in the process, will enter the trap and get caught. They are considered cruel by some though - see "Action Against Corvoid Traps" for more information, and to get the full picture.

If the magpies / crows on your holding are 'turned on' to eating eggs at the moment, it is quite likely that a Larsen trap baited with eggs will catch them (our local gamekeeper told me that using a 'fake nest' of hens eggs, with one broken to show the yolk, works very well at this time of year). The traps themselves can be bought from Ebay etc. However, you do absolutely need to read up on the regulations, and get a license first.