buffleheads

[Don Mintz]

The paint wasn't great on those tanglefree's. I just finished carving and flocking 10 more buffleheads that I sent to my son's shop for painting, four of them drakes.

 

[Patrick Ward]

The paint wasn't great on those tanglefree's. I just finished carving and flocking 10 more buffleheads that I sent to my son's shop for painting, four of them drakes.

I look forward to seeing the final product!

I'm thinking about flocking some of our decoys. Would you recommend flocking all black, then hand-painting the white?

 

[William Reinicke]

I look forward to seeing the final product!

I'm thinking about flocking some of our decoys. Would you recommend flocking all black, then hand-painting the white?

Black and white flocking. Painting white over black is a PIA and takes multiple coats.

 

[Don Mintz]

For the drakes, I'll flock the whole thing grey over grey rustoleum for a first coat, then the head and back all the way through the tail and femoral tract with black over black rustoleum. A second coat of grey over the area you want white. That gives you a double coat which is important to durability. Then paint over the grey area with flat white and paint the head part behind the eye and back of the head with white, likely you will have to paint the head white twice. Paint over the rump and tail one coat of flat white and it will leave the area behind the wings a nice light grey.

 

[Reid Leonard]

A drake bufflehead was the first diver I ever shot. Our view of waterfowl hunting when I was a kid was limited to puddlers and primarily mallards. When I shot my drake bufflehead, we weren't sure what it was other than a duck, dad called it a baldpate, we had never seen a wigeon at that point, so I just went with it till I could investigate a little more. I have a group of 6 in the works right now, but I've been working toward a 9 hens and 2 drakes for the upcoming season. I'm kind of kicking the idea around about the black line at the top of the flank and just leaving it all white, after all they are hunting decoys. They are just under a pound which will help with the 3 mile round trip to the blind.

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I took this photo on a hunt about 10 years ago and made note about how black the hens heads were compared to the plastic bufflehead I designed for Tanglefree. I did design a hen bufflehead for them, but they never put it into production, so I flocked and painted 9 hens. The duck on the far right is a second year drake.
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@Don Mintz - You make some great looking birds. I’m fairly new to carving and just finished my first duck which was a buffy. I’d like to eventually make some gunning birds and try my hand at flocking. Thanks for sharing!