bob
what is going on with that black, is the entire body splattered?
[size 5]Kris,
Some of us are old enough to remember when painting rules in some gunning/service decoy contests specified "combing, ragging, & stippling" as the only acceptable means of achieving detail on a contest gunner.... and some of us are old enough to remember how to do those things [smile] ..... yet not so old, that we have forgotten how.
The decoy pictured above has been "ragged." Basically, ragging is just what it sounds like: using a bunched-up shop rag dipped in color (very thin amounts), and then popping that color on over the base color of the decoy.
That particular decoy was carved from an original group of six, date-palm fronds that the late Bobby Sutton sent me sometime in 2007. The '07-'08 season was the first year I used those birds, so that particular decoy has been gunned over for 10 seasons now.
Last week I had occasion to repair & touch up the paint on a number of those decoys, one of which had a big dent in the breast area that needed repair.
Originally, they had all been flat, blackduck "black," but as I was doing the repaints, I thought it might be fun to rag the lighter color onto the bodies. When one backs off to 35-40 yards, they look even better than they do up close. Sometimes the old tricks are just the ticket!
Here's the one I did the breast repair on that kicked off the ragging repaints on the others:
View attachment Sutton1.jpg
The heads on all these decoys are spatter painted.
