Anyone carve or mold their own duck decoys?

[Dead Ringer]

I've got a few things you can try if you're looking to get into it. This album contains many pictures of my various decoy projects. If you have questions on the specifics in the pics, let me know.

- foamers - easy to carve, more work to finish. If done right, very durable and can take pellets without issue. About $5-8 per decoy when it's all said and done - I posted a tutorial on this forum.
- v-boards - more shaped like a y, but called v-boards. These hold 3 silhouette decoys apiece. Most commonly used for magnum divers and geese. Really easy to make if you're not a putz with a jigsaw or bandsaw and drill. A bit bulky, but can just use a few with usual spread to boost visibility. If you get off-cuts of ply and 1-by, you can make a single v-board with sillys for $5-10.
- canvas over wire - these are really something else. The resulting decoys are something to behold. I've only done 2, but they are some of my favorite DIY decoys yet.

Some things I haven't done:
- wood and cork - both require more skill to carve than foam and cork can be pricey
- molding - Big Lake Decoys is the guy to talk to about this. You can make a lot of very durable decoys without the work of carving. Will be somewhat limited in poses compared to carving, but can make some alterations.
- a different type of v-board - Can stack many of these together and are very easy to deploy.

lancecooper on here had some interesting floating sillhouettes and other handmade decoys. Search and you will find. Also, Lowflyer's foamer rig makes mine look like a drop in the bucket!

The best resource for decoy making is workingdecoyforum. Also, there's a lot of pattern and painting books at the public library or on eBay.

If you are going to get into carving (foam, burlap or wood) and aren't planning on knifing it for nostalgia, then look for a used foredom. It's a HD version of a dremel that can handle the load and turn a much larger kutzall bit. I did some with Dremels, but they always burned out and the tiny bits are slow for carving blocks. The foredom was a game changer.

One of the best things I've done to cut the cost of making decoys is to "freecycle" whenever possible. I've picked up lots of the blue foam from job sites. I use trex keels which aren't cheap, but I've also got that free. Some tile guys won't use the 2nd half of their mastic tubs. If you know people in construction, you can get a bit here, a bit there and cut the cost a bit.

I'd say start with the y-boards to ease into it and then progress to foamers as diverduck suggested.

[Sprite]

I've been working on molding expandable foam decoys for the past month or so. Once I get things smoothed out and working nicely, I'll post up some pictures!

-Nick

[Killswitch]

Please do Sprite, Im about to head down that road so any advice or first hand info would be greatly appreciated.

Switch

[happy]

We've been carving ours out of cedar with pine heads. They aren't perfect but they work awesome.P1010541.jpgP1010547.jpg

[TurkeyRookie]

We've been carving ours out of cedar with pine heads. They aren't perfect but they work awesome.P1010541.jpgP1010547.jpg

How much would a dozen of those weigh?

[Sprite]

How much would a dozen of those weigh?

They would weigh quite a bit. Most guys who run burlapped or restle coated foamers, and or wood decoys are running them from boats, so weight isn't as much of a factor.

If I had a walk-in diver spot, I'd definitely be hauling plastics.

-Nick

[happy]

The wood decoys I make all weigh 1 lb 7 oz plus or minus an oz. or 2. With the lead righting weight and lead anchor weight about 2 lbs. We use about 4 doz., so about a hundred lbs total. We remove the anchor weights and attach the dekes to a rope system when we hunt Lake Ontario from shore, but we use lead weighted anchors at each end of the rope so its about the same weight total. Plus these dekes should last a couple hundred years.LOL

[Dead Ringer]

They would weigh quite a bit. Most guys who run burlapped or restle coated foamers, and or wood decoys are running them from boats, so weight isn't as much of a factor.

If I had a walk-in diver spot, I'd definitely be hauling plastics.

-Nick

Foamers can be very light actually, depending on the build. Mine aren't since I use the heavy trex keels (about 75% of the weight), but I have handled keel-less foamers that were substantially lighter than weighted-keel plastics and they held their own in diver waters.

[MikePal]

While the topic is open;

A few yrs back I posted that I have some Basswood blocks aged and dried for carving if anyone was interested.





One of the carvers came back and said they were no good for carving because they had cracked...

I forgot to pursue it, but this threat reminded me....with a soft wood like Basswood the cracks don't go very far into the wood. I grabbed a log just now and cut off an 1" from the end and the 'weather' cracks are all but gone, a little farther and you would have lots of good wood for carving in the centre of these blocks.



Where I cut firewood there is lots of basswood that we sometime have to drop and leave on the forest floor. So if your in eastern Ont or want to pay shipping, I'll gladly let you have them free.

[duckduckgoose]

Hey Dead Ringer, I finally got to some free internet, but when I click on your album, it says "password protected". Not a big deal, just tried to take a look...