Brant rig, homage to Worth, BradF, Steve Sutton, Tod and other members here

Brad Bortner

Brad Bortner

Well-known member
Supporter
I have been accumulating wood and cork brant decoys for several years and I love to hunt them. I posted about a portion of the rig http://www.duckboats.net/...0brant%20rig#p237014 from Worth when he started selling the rig that he and Dave Hagerbaumer hunted. I bought a more few in support of the Washington Brant Foundation and then bought representative pairs from Steve Sutton when he decided to move to Florida. I am sure that all of the carvers were either brant hunters or intended that their creations be hunted. Brant season in Washington is limited to only a few days in January and the weather restricts leaving port on many days. Last year, every single day of the brant season had gale warnings flying and I never made it out on the big salt. But yesterday I got a chance to wash the dust off the decoys with salt water. Here are a few shots from the rig. I can't tell you how much joy it brings me to float this rig and think of all of the carvers and brant hunters who have made these decoys or hunted over some of these decoys. Thanks guys.

Just a portion of the rig soaking in the salt.

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These beauties are from BradF. I am extremely grateful to have these birds from Brad since he was my decoy carving mentor and has been a hunting companion and friend for probably 20 years.

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A pair of Tod Osier's creations placed on permanent loan by Steve Sutton on the condition that he could hunt over them whenever he returned to Washington State for a brant hunt.

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Three by Bill Wasson.
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A couple of Bill Pinches' birds.
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I won't show them all but I just wanted to remember Steve and all the carvers and hunters.

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My boy Brant keeping an eye out for his namesake.

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Great story and photos. I'll be almost embarrassed setting out my plastic brant decoys tomorrow. They work, but nothing like the beauties you have. Awesome rig.
Come to think of it, I am setting out 2 cork divers to swim in front of my brant tomorrow.
Thanks for sharing
Mike
 
Brad, that is quite a collection of various carvers. I really like the old style carving of Bill Pinches. Simple but effective.

RVZ
 
Nice homage to our DHBP family of carvers.

I know Steve was smiling when this rig hit the water.
 
He is 10 Years old Pat. His number of retrieves this year is down because lack of other guns in the boat, the 2 scaup limit and no trip to Canada. He probably only has 200 retrieved birds this year. But I did introduce him to sharptail and prairie chicken hunting. 7 month old Jake is learning quickly.
 
Great rig Brad.Since I live in NJ, brant are common in the winter, and they are as fun to watch as any fowl, and listen to-I love the sound of flocks of brant trading around the bays. I used to hunt them a fair amount when I hunted on the coast. One year they were in the marsh all of the time in an area I used to hunt near Ocean City NJ. And by that, I mean they were in the small creeks and shallow tidal ponds, all season. So I shot, and ate, a lot of brant that year. It forced me to learn how to cook them (I put in my $.02 in the thread about eating brant earlier in the year). But to have a gunning rig like that just for brant is very cool, and I'm sure you enjoy using it.
 
Now that's cool. I'm gonna take you up on your offer one of these days and get out there. I hear the black Brant are about as good eating as they get.
 
Brad Bortner said:
Well they worked again, the weather was almost too nice 55, sunny and calm.
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Glad you got out!

Yesterday was our last day and I wimped out with a small craft advisory predicted. The weather didn't show until a little later than they thought and I would have had plenty of time to get out to hunt prime time for a couple hours. We ended strong with the last trip though.
 
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