Mystery Decoys of Lake Koshkonong

Tim Speight

Tim Speight

Active member
Just posted a new segment on the Lake Koshkonong Decoy. Bill and Marty Sands do a nice job providing the history, styling features and their thoughts on how these unique decoys came to be. Hope you enjoy!

Here's the link http://www.thedecoyshed.org/on_the_mantel2.php?id=26

Tim

P.S. Bill mentions the gunning scow Reckless. After doing a little Google surfing I learned that the gunning scows were essentially floating hotels for the well heeled sport shooters that traveled from New York, Boston and other places to hunt Canvasbacks on the Chesapeake Bay. While not very handsome on the outside these craft had quite elegant interiors, some with cabins made entirely from Mahagony. Each of these floating resorts were outfitted with several Sink-boxes, sneak boats, tenders and numerous rigs of decoys. For inventory control, the name of the owning scow was heavily branded on the decoys. Three of the best known were Reckless, Susquehanna, and North Carolina.
 
Tim, i am fortunate to own a hen can from the RECKLESS. Picked it up almost 30 years ago from a used items dealer in magnolia, delaware, along with a John Glenn pintail.
The can was used a few times when cans reopened around here-figured that the old ones i had needed a bit of work.
Good seeing Bill even on video!
 
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Nice work Tim! Love the history!! Where else could a waterfowler hear and learn about Lake Koshkonong Decoys but on The Decoy Shed!

I appreciate you keeping this tradition alive.
 
Excellent Tim and thank you for the opportunity for us to talk about this little known style of decoys. I really appreciate the project your under taking, collecting and documenting the history is so valuable. I think a road trip is in store for you to the east coast.

The NYtimes article archive is found to search through. Their are blurbs about hunting the flats and the different scows that were out. Besides catering to traveling hunters their were a number that were held for private use, like the SY Tech a DuPont family scow that has brands show up from time to time. Connetts duck shooting the Atlantic tidewater has a nice first hand account of hunting out of one of these vessels.

Keep up the great work, and if you make it this way I have a guy who would be a great fit for your series.
 
Bill, next time you get to h de g, drag speight with you.
Hope to see you all in may--Any rig of divers, any pair for saturday.
 
Tim
Were you aware of the duck hunters that died there in the marsh North part of the lake? It's been a few years ago now.
wis boz
 
Tim,
I really appreciate what you are doing with the site and specifically recording the regional history. One of the things I noticed in that video was the way the bottom of some of the decoys resembled the IL river decoys I have held but more surprising were the decoys we held at Winous point duck club in Ohio that also had that style bottom. So much of the history is lost to time which makes preserving that we do know that much more important.

Thank you!
 
brandon check out page 57 of Joesph Long's American Wild-fowl Shooting from 1879 its on google ebooks for free. He shows pictures of how to make a decoy that has the same V-bottom. I know there is another book in that same time frame that shows a similar style of decoy. I am not sure where you saw the other bird, but I have seen examples of the Upper Susquehenna river, illinios river and Koshkonong and I am sure there is more. All had flow through current. I am sure they designed the decoys to suit their style and felt the V bottom was ideal for current.
 
Thanks everyone! Glad you enjoyed that segment.

Wis Boz I'm not really familiar with Lake Koshkonong so I didn't know about any lost hunters.
 
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