Camaraderie, craftsmanship, conservation
OCONTO – By 8:30 a.m. Tuesday the sun had climbed above the Door Peninsula and the southwest wind had freshened over the waters Green Bay.
One-foot waves plopped into the stern and rocked the layout boat – and me – from side to side.
Hunting from the flat crafts is typically adventurous and challenging.
Tuesday’s outing included a special caution.
As six canvasbacks circled low into the sun and the boat rolled, Paul Wait’s words echoed in my head.
“Don’t shoot the decoys!” Wait warned in equal parts humor and seriousness.
As it happened, the cans veered southwest, affording a shot to Todd Burns of Sycamore, Illinois, who was hunting in a layout boat 40 yards to my south.
Minutes later the tender boat, piloted by Wait, came out and picked up the hen canvasback shot by Burns.
The first round of action was a complete success with one fine duck in the bag and the decoys were no worse for wear.
“Nice job,” Wait called out and as he raised a gloved thumb and motored back toward shore.
He might also have had his fingers crossed.
The gathering wasn’t an ordinary duck outing. It was the 8th annual Delta Waterfowl Decoy Hunt, a tradition that combines camaraderie, craftsmanship and conservation.
The spread of 140 decoys bobbing in the water around included 13 custommade bluebills. These “celebrities” were specially commissioned for the hunt and intended to be auctioned off over the next year to raise funds for Delta’s conservation programs.
One such decoy, a redhead in Year 3 of the special hunt series, fetched $4,200.
It’s not clear if steel shot impregnated in the wood and paint would raise or lower the price of the keepsakes, but it would definitely change the look.
I kept my eyes, and barrel, above the waterline.
Wait, the editor of Delta Waterfowl magazine, started the decoy hunt in 2013 with Pat Gregory, an award-winning decoy carver from Bloomington, Illinois.
The men share a passion and respect for the art of carving. After Wait met Gregory in 2011, they hatched an idea to highlight contemporary carvers, gather hunters for a unique experience and raise funds for conservation.
So over the last eight years they’ve selected a species and a location for the hunt and then asked carvers to contribute hand-made decoys to the effort.
This year the theme was bluebills, or scaup, and the location was Green Bay near Oconto. It was the first time the event was held in Wisconsin.
Carvers from Virginia to North Dakota contributed decoys, including Wisconsinites Mark Berquist of Hayward and Bruce Urben of Green Bay.
“We tell the carvers no matter how beautiful it is, it’s got to float and we’ve got to be able to hunt over it,” said Wait, 52, of New London.
The 13 celebrity decoys were on a string among about 13 dozen other commercially made dekes.
In addition to Wait, Burns, Gregory, Urben and me, our hunting crew included Brad Heidel of Dane, Delta’s senior director of corporate relations and advertising sales, and Mark Katatsch of Oconomowoc, an avid decoy maker and waterfowler.
Our group took turns hunting from two layout boats. We also had two “mother ships” staged a few hundred yards away from the decoy spread.
When a shot was fired, one of the motorboats would sprint out to retrieve the game.
Tuesday featured fair skies and a southwest wind that built throughout the day. A mix of divers and dabblers
Custom-made bluebill, or scaup, decoys were part of the spread used in the eighth annual Delta Waterfowl Decoy Hunt on the waters of Green Bay. The decoys will be auctioned off over the next year to raise funds for conservation. worked the skies throughout. A trio of tundra swans also made a close-range flyover.
Gregory, 62, started carving decoys in 1984. It runs in his genes, even if it skipped a couple generations.
His maternal great-grandfather, George Barto, was an acclaimed baseball player and decoy carver in central Illinois; Barto’s carving career spanned the 1890s to the 1950s.
Gregory grew up in a non-hunting family but began to do some rabbit hunting with friends as a youth and got a taste of waterfowl hunting after college. He got hooked on the challenge, craftsmanship and history of waterfowling.
Now retired after a career at American Family Insurance, he carves decoys each year from March to September, then turns his attention to hunting. His carving hobby enriches his waterfowling.
“It’s a great thrill for me to know my decoys are out there contributing to the hunt,” Gregory said.
And now, through the annual Delta Waterfowl Decoy Hunt, his carving and painting skill contributes to a unique conservation fundraiser. Gregory has contributed at least one decoy to the event in each of its eight years.
In the inaugural event Wait and Gregory organized a northern shoveler hunt in central Illinois. The second it was off to Florida for blue-winged teal, where the spread drew more than ducks.
“We had gators in our decoys twice,” Gregory said.
The third year they traveled to the Ontario waters of Lake Erie to hunt redheads, then in 2016 it was a ruddy duck hunt on the Mississippi River in Iowa and Illinois.
In Year 6 the American wigeon was the featured species on the Columbia River in Oregon and Washington.
In 2018 the group turned their sights to Canada and hunted canvasbacks on Delta Marsh in Manitoba, the namesake and place of origin for Delta Waterfowl.
The organization was founded in 1911 at the storied marsh by James Ford Bell of General Mills Corporation. Bell was concerned about duck populations, particularly canvasbacks, and established a goal of putting back two ducks for every one shot by hunters at his club on the marsh.
Delta Waterfowl is now headquartered in Bismarck, North Dakota. The organization conducts annual research, conservation and hunter recruitment programs.
Last year the decoy hunt highlighted American black ducks in Delaware.
Each year Wait and Gregory invite a new crew of hunters to join them in the quest.
This year they intended to hunt pintails in the Sacramento Valley of California. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, they scaled back their plans to allow for less travel.
So Year 8 of the Delta Waterfowl Decoy Hunt landed in Wisconsin for the first time.
From Monday through Wednesday, hunters took to the waters east of Oconto and Geano Beach and laid out the long lines of dekes.
The bag included nine species of ducks: bufflehead, canvasback, common goldeneye, red-breasted merganser, redhead, ring-necked, ruddy, and of course bluebills, formally known as lesser and greater scaup.
The bluebill action was best on Wednesday, when eight scaup were among the total of 14 ducks.
The celebrity dekes got a workout fitting of big water hunting, too. On Tuesday the waves increased to 3-foot rollers by quitting time, and there were floated in small craft advisories on Wednesday.
It was a privilege for me to join the group this year.
And for the record, know this: The hunt ended without a single pellet in a decoy. Come banquet time, here’s hoping the “lucky 13” bluebills raise a bunch of money for Delta’s programs.
“We have cheerful givers in the waterfowling and decoy collecting communities,” Gregory said. “I expect this flock of decoys will get a warm reception, too.”