question for carvers ?

L

LI Mike

Active member
I'm an amateur carver just looking for a book suggestion for stencils of ducks. Preferably one with the largest selection of birds I already have mallard,black,ringneck,but need redhead pintail and whatever else i my carve down the line. thanks for your time Mike
 
Mark -
Are you wanting to make ducks or decoys to gun over?

For gunners I would look at
Pat Godin Vol 4
Workbench Projects - Traditional Hunting Decoys by Mark Costilow
 
The most complete sets you will get are Bruce Burkes Decorative Decoy carvers Ultimate Pattern and painting Portfolio books, there is one for divers and one for puddlers, or Pat Godins books one for puddlers, one for divers, and a mixed book with World shooting rigs. Also one for seaducks, but it is pretty hard to come by and pricey if you find it. Godins patterns are better, but the Burk book have painting instructions which come in pretty handy.
Either way not one book to cover all species. Also do a google search on Gordon Stiller patterns, not a book but individual patterns of just about any species you can imagine. Except for Godin Vol.4 all patterns are for decorative deoys and will need modified for hunting. There are some others out there, but these will get you going.
 
I recommend Pat Godin's Volume 1(Marsh Ducks-All North American species of puddle ducks in both hens and drakes.) and 2(Divers-All North American species of divers in both hens and drakes.). You might want to widen the patterns just a bit. Easy to do and makes the decoy more stable. Here is a link that shows how to widen your patterns:

http://www.refugeforums.com/refuge/showthread.php?t=832481

Both of these books can be bought at The Duck Blind:

http://www.theduckblind.com/godin_decoy_pattern_books.htm

Hope this helps!
 
Another book you may want to add to your collection is "Making Decoys-The Century Old Way" by Grayson Chesser and Curtis Badger. The newer Expanded Edition (2006) has more info than the original.
 
Grayson's book will give you some philosophical reasons for making and using dekes-
Being a long islander, you might want to put an ad somewhere for a set of Al McCormick's decoy blueprints
Al was quite instrumental in getting a ton of fellows up you way addicted to making dekes
Suggest you contact someone from south shore waterfowlers
sswa.org
 
Another book you may want to add to your collection is "Making Decoys-The Century Old Way" by Grayson Chesser and Curtis Badger. The newer Expanded Edition (2006) has more info than the original.
Click to expand...
i've heard this before, and i have the hardback edition......my question is, is the expanded addition worth getting as well? i guess what i'm asking is "what's expanded" in this addition - more patterns or painting talk/demos?

thanks, justin
 
Last edited:
I have both versions. The newer edition is a slightly larger format so the pictures are about 10% larger. The major difference I see is the newer edition has a 13 page demo on painting a Canada Goose that was not in the original. The newer edition is in paperback and available thru Amazon for about $15 plus S&H.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top