Oobie and I dragged half the rig off the marsh yesterday

The teal seemed to fare well, but as usual, the #$%$%#% gadwall needed attention.
So far, i have rehabbed 15 drakes, mostly balsa, and 6 hens, same for them.
The hens just needed some touchup work on bills, a few patches here and there, but the drakes, as usual, needed some retouch toward waterline, which included reblack, re-vermiculation, then reworking the whitish into the sides and back area with a dry brush--always fun.
All bottoms have been cleaned and retouched, so a big part of the rig is now ready for the call come fall.
Tomorrow, we mercifully finish an abysmal year. Still have to drag in the mallards, blacks, sprig and widgeon. Hopefully, a few feathered friends will come back with us on the sleds for dinner tomorrow..Some sprig finally are around, so que sera.
The drag ut is always a mite harder than the in trip, but we hope to get all back to the shop later on.
Already have some speckled teal and a silver teal done for the trip south in may!

Hate to see the season end tomorrow, George. We'll be up to the blind at daybreak for one last hurrah. Not expecting to do too much; just hoping to knock down a few birds in those early flights. Today woulda been the day to gun up to the marsh in that wind and weather, but work got in the way. Heard from a couple groups who had limit hunts on mallards, blacks, sprigs, wigeon, gaddies and even a green-winged teal in the mix!

Time to start grinding out some more decoys this off-season and also do some serous training with "Kooper" for his second year of hunting.

Hey, at least you guys get to hunt till the last Saturday in January! Jersey really F'ed us this year.

We did take a few teal, a shoveler and a sprig today--Dog showed his ass first thing so i was not in much of a mood for the first light stuff.
One ball of teal we observed numbered in the hundreds, no fooling! We unloaded, got straightened up, heard whistling, and voila, about forty settled between the sprig and blacks and four geese--Bob managed to get one shell in his gun but when the receiver closed, they all skedaddled!
Everything is now washed, the gaddies are all repaired, and the rehab stuff is drying in the garage---Guess i will start with the blackducks!

Ended up with 2 Blacks, a mallard and a beautiful GWT drake on an otherwise slow day. Really surprised that nobody was out there in the marsh with us considering it was the closing day.

We also saw a huge ball of teal that came off the refuge pools and flew south. Biggest group of teal we've seen since the 2nd split.

Crazy season, huh?! Northern birds just never seemed to get here. Be interesting to see what the duck and goose numbers are like next year.

Gotta seal and paint up a mallard drake tomorrow for a presentation I'm doing for a middle school conservation club later this week. I'm supposed to get the kids excited about wetlands and conservation. Figured a decoy-making demonstration might be a good way to engage a few of those knuckleheads!

I just did some straightening up in the shop today, back to decoy work very soon. I have 4 more goofy jersey mallards to go with these two knucklehead drakes I made.



Once I get them gone, I've got a bufflehead order to get working on and a cedar mallard rig (not the goofy style). Looking forward to playing with the new airbrush system.

Great looking mallard block, Davey! Here are four I finished up this month for my presentation to the middle-schoolers on WED (if it's not obvious to some, I'm mentoring under George Williams). I was up 'til early this morning trying to get the Mallard drake completed.

Davey Welsh wrote:Hey, at least you guys get to hunt till the last Saturday in January! Jersey really F'ed us this year.

Davey you can say Jersey really F'd us but as I type its 50 degrees and sunny as far as this year was conccerned I think they did us a favor and ended the pain for us early

Just a good excuse to clean things up today and get ready for this year's carving projects

Ed, those dekes look superb! I wish I had a local mentor.

Larry, you're right about the season ending early. Now I can get back to carving and get some things done on the boat. The season endig is just a tough pill for me to swallow...even on a shitty year.

You can always come over and help repair and repaint the rest of the rig--Just mallard drakes-from collar up, and both hen and drake sprig--Only 9, though. Two just needed tail tips repainted along with the bottoms and bill edges-Just black!!
The others, don't even ask! The faster i rehab, the faster i can get started on some new stuff---As long as the snows do not present themselves on the digs!

george w wrote:You can always come over and help repair and repaint the rest of the rig--Just mallard drakes-from collar up, and both hen and drake sprig--Only 9, though. Two just needed tail tips repainted along with the bottoms and bill edges-Just black!!
The others, don't even ask! The faster i rehab, the faster i can get started on some new stuff---As long as the snows do not present themselves on the digs!

You know George, I just may make a trip to Delaware this year. Its only a 2hr drive, but for a chance to work with a decoy maker such as yourself is well worth the drive. I am still trying to find my rythmn with making "gunning" blocks. I seem to go too much or not enough.

One of the things one has to decide is how much or how little to do---My thought on that has always led me to a simple observation: you are shooting ducks at twenty yards or more, depending upon how you set your stool. What often looks just wonderful in hand is superfluous at that distance.

Simple test, detail one with paint, do a reasonably simple deke, then look at them from twenty yards..I think the question will likely answer itself. After twenty plus years, i added the tertials to blackducks, because i did notice they popped at a distance--never going to add the body detail, 'casue it just does not show.
let me know when you wnat to drop over--best in spring, when all of this bad weather has departed! heheh

Thanks for the tips George. Do you carve the side pockets in on your birds? What about the primaries?

I do a little delineation between the top and sides--Found that putting that side pocket area seems to make the deke appear wider, and since it is a mite narrower at the top--think pyramid, it self rights easier-less lead.
I am just too lazy to do all that excess grinding, so just never carved primaries.Paint seems to suffice, plus, there is less to chip and break. Remember, you are making a decoy, not a swiss watch!!!