What is a Decoy? 

Decoy ducks are floating lures that ride at anchor, attached to twine and fastened to a weight that drops to the bottom of a lake or pond. Such anchoring allows the bird some semblance of movement and keeps it from getting away. The shorebird decoy was called a "stickup" because of the practice of mounting them on sticks and setting them in the ground at the shore.

About Laurel Dabbs

Laurel Dabbs has been making traditional authentic working decoys, shorebirds and songbirds since 1988. Using antique hand-tools and Atlantic white cedar she demonstrates the art of carving at living history events through museum programs and also school groups, scout troops, along with wildlife and conservation events. She has won several awards including the Harry V. Shourds Memorial Master Carver Award in 2002 at the Decoy and Gunning Show, held in Tuckerton, New Jersey.

 
Harry Shourds and Laurel Dabbs

Other programs Laurel has done in the past: 

• Mission Houses Museum in Honolulu, Hawaii

• Wheaton Village, Millville, New Jersey (resident decoy carver)

• Cold Spring Village, Cape May, New Jersey

• Pioneer Settlement, Barberville, Florida

• Longaberger American Heritage Events, Newark, Ohio

• Historic Roscoe Village, Coshocton, Ohio

• Champlain Valley Exposition's Living History, Essex Junction, Vermont

Some of the ongoing and current events Laurel works with during the year include:

• An Artist in Residence at the Shelburne Museum, Shelburne, Vermont

• Cracker Country Living History at the Florida State Fair, Tampa, Florida

• Pioneer Village at the Strawberry Festival, Plant City, Florida

• Decoys on exhibit at the Dennisville Historical Society & Museum as part of the George Brewer Collection, Dennisville, New Jersey

• For the past 4 consecutive years has been selected as one of Early American Life Magazine's Top 200 Best Traditional Craftsmen

• Ongoing exhibit for the Great Lakes Historical Society at the Inland Seas Maritime Museum, Vermilion, Ohio: "Decoys: The Work and Collection of Laurel Dabbs"

• Ocean County Decoy and Gunning Competition in Tuckerton, New Jersey: First Place Working Shorebird Rig, Lloyd Parker Memorial Award, 2006.

• Exhibiting since 2006 at the annual Waterford Homes Tour and Fine Crafts Exhibit, the premier juried invitational Early American Arts event held in the National Historic Landmark Village of Waterford, Virginia since 1943. Waterford was founded in 1733.

Galleries where Laurel's work is featured:

• "Colonial Retrospectives, A Gallery." Located on South Spring Street in Harrisville, West Virginia, this is Country Cabinetmaker Gary Carter's gallery, featuring traditional artists and artisans from West Virginia and the Ohio Valley.

• "The Chairmaker and Friends" is Garrett Aston's gallery, showcasing his handmade Windsor chairs and early American furniture, mixed with outstanding antique primitives and traditional American folk art made with considerable study of the heritage of our past. Works in progress are also on view, on Center Street in Seville, Ohio.

The tradition and history of her work is as important to Laurel Dabbs as the style and form of her carvings. She always brings her workbench along with her to events to give live demonstrations in the art of carving. The life-sized carvings range from tiny chickadees to great blue herons.

Laurel's New Jersey style working decoys start out as eight-foot planks of two-inch thick Atlantic white "swamp" cedar from George Brewer's sawmill in South Dennis, New Jersey. After planing one side, she band-saws out the shape from her own patterns of the particular species of duck or bird she is making. The profiles and excess wood are chopped with a hatchet and the two halves are hollowed out with a mallet and curved gouge. The top and bottom pieces are glued and nailed, and a spokeshave is used to smooth and shape the body and tail. The head is sawed out separately and the neck is doweled for strength. After carving, the head is glued and nailed on, carved into the body, and the entire bird is sanded. Molten lead is poured into a cavity in the bottom (to self-right the decoy for hunting purposes), and the bird is branded (originally branding was done to prove ownership of decoys that had floated away). After this process a coat of sealer, followed by several coats of durable house paint, assures a sturdy finish that stands up to the rigors of field use. 

All Laurel Dabbs' decoys, shorebirds, and songbirds are made authentically with hand-tools. Her birds will stand the test of time, as did their predecessors a century ago.

History of the American Decoy

The carved bird decoy is the only truly American folk art. Decoys as an aid to hunting was devised by the American Indian and has grown as a useful art since the days of the colonists. Europe in fact, learned about decoys from America - a novel switch in cultural relations.

The colonists found that food in their new country was plentiful but not easy to come by, so the art of decoy making was developed. The Indians had learned, and the new Americans were quickly to learn that wood, rushes, or any handy material worked into the shapes of birds and set provocatively along the shore or in the water could lure, outwit or bag the duck or goose which tasted very good after a diet of salt pork, dried corn and beans. Therefore, as immigrants began feeding their families, the decoy was quickly adapted as a valuable tool.

The earliest decoys made by these folks were fashioned by the dictates of each settlement's new environs and their culture heritages. The flamboyant and colorful lures of Louisiana, the elaborately carved birds of Quebec, and the Puritan influences styling of Connecticut and early Ohio decoys illuminated each areas predominant "old country" influence in the new country.

The wooden decoy appeals to us today not simply that it is a hunting device, but because in the making of the carving and painting, the hunters satisfied their natural need for expression, their need to create. Thus, a folk art was born.

Of all our folk arts, none is more strikingly American than the decoy. Indigenous to this country, popular in use, created out of native woods and natural formation, what could be more expressive of the people, their need and their individuality.

Decoy carving was developed and refined to such a degree that now, early and well carved birds are prized by collectors. In January 2003 the sale price of a decoy from the Aitkens Collection for a preening pintail drake by Elmer Crowell went for more than $800,000.00, in New York City, at a Christie's Auction.  That number was later exceeded in a private sale of the two previous record-breaking Crowell decoys for more than $1,200,000.00 each!

The material for this history was obtained from the following books. We encourage you to read more about this interesting topic.

American Bird Decoys - William J. Mackey Jr.
Collectors Guide to Decoys - Linda and Gene Kangas
Early American Woodcarving - Erwino Christensen
The Art of the Decoy: American Bird Carving - Adele Earnest

P.O. Box 265  -  Westfield Center, Ohio 44251
Phone: 330.887.1613  -  Email: info@laureldabbs.com