1960's Pair of Mallards by Ron Koch of Rivermoor, Wisconsin. Special order for the Sawbill Gun Club.

Wisconsin decoys and decoy carvers are worthy of an entire post, but for today I wanted to share this pair of mallards we sold in 2014. They were made by Ron Koch of Rivermoor. Ron is a carver, author and sportsman. Here is a snippet about him I found on Wooden-Decoy.com

"Ron Koch (Rivermoor, Wisconsin) is a renowned carver of gunning decoys whose work is featured in Loy Harrell's Decoys—Sixty Living and Outstanding North American Carvers. Ron (the "River Rat") is a regular contributor to Hunting & Fishing Collectibles, a historian of Wisconsin decoys (Decoys of the Winnebago Lakes), and the author of two popular books about duck hunting. His latest book, Behind the Back Shelf, tells the very funny stories behind his The Back Shelf page in Hunting & Fishing Collectibles magazine".

The Chicago Tribune did a great article on Mr. Koch on November 16, 2003. It talks about his approach to duck hunting and the great outdoors.

OMRO, Wis. — The old duck hunter huddled low in the cattails on a cold, bright afternoon, the 25-m.p.h. wind twisting and bending the tall grass like so many rubber hoses. It was a narrow point of land at the mouth of the Fox River where the water bleeds into Lake Butte des Morts--and a splendid place to wait for ducks.
The temperature was 28 degrees, and faint-of-heart hunters were home tending fireplaces despite a welcoming blue sky. It was just the old duck hunter here with his dog Augie, a brown American water spaniel, and a 12-gauge Browning pump shotgun.

"I like to hunt alone, mostly," Ron Koch said. "I'm kind of a lone wolf."
Gray-haired, slightly built and wearing a uniform of full camouflage, Koch, 64, recognizes he is in the autumn of his duck hunting career after 51 years of working these waters and nearby marshes. He estimates he has put in 2,300 days on the hunt, but the days are getting shorter and accommodations to age are in order.
Now his wife makes him take along a cell phone, just in case.
Resting on his knees, Koch paddled his 40-year-old fiberglass-hulled skiff most of the half-mile from home to claim this spot. Part of the way he used a two-horsepower motor to help tow a visitor in a second skiff.
"When I was young," he said, "I hunted all day. Now, after three or four hours, I'm done."
The old duck hunter grew up in this area and always has lived in one of the towns on the outskirts of Oshkosh. His father took him duck hunting when he was 13, and it was a treat. Then it became a passion. His wife Connie, his children, the job as a rural letter carrier from which he retired, the Green Bay Packers and duck hunting. Those are the things that have defined his life.
Perhaps 1 million ducks have flown overhead. Mallards, pintails, redheads, mergansers, gadwell, canvasbacks, wigeon, teal, bluebills, buffleheads. It has been ducks unlimited. How many thousand shots has he taken? How many dinners of grilled or roast duck have been cooked, accompanied by mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce and pie?
The skiffs were parked. One was disguised in the water by trees and weeds. One was lifted onshore and became a bench in the cattails.
"Be still if anything comes," Koch said. "Make like a stump."
It is not just the hunting time--the equivalent of more than six years in the field--fueling the old duck hunter's ardor.


Ducks are in season only in October, November and December. The rest of the time, Koch carves decoys, collects decoys, writes stories for magazines about duck hunting and writes books about duck hunting. One is called "All Duck Hunters Are Crazy."
Koch calls himself a crazy old duck hunter. That means weather doesn't matter.
"The ice keeps the Charley Hot Dogs out," he likes to say.
Even before Koch placed his 15 decoys and they began bobbing on the surface of the turbulent water, three mallards took off. Another duck flew past. Then two more.
For a while he sat and gazed at the decoys and the setting. Not far away, dead, brown, wrinkled lotus plants curled in the water. A quartet of swans flew by. Homes could be seen across the churning water. No other boats appeared.

Koch is a choosy hunter. He shoots only what he will eat and he won't eat all types of ducks. Some are too gamy, he said.
"I love sitting out here," Koch said.
When he was younger, sitting wasn't enough. Koch burned to fill his six-duck limit every time he hunted.
"Twenty-five years ago," he said, "if I was out and I didn't hit anything, I was upset. Now I don't care one way or the other."
He laughed at himself.
"I'm a dinosaur," the old duck hunter said. "Most guys don't hunt like this. They have bigger motors, and when they shoot a duck they just go get it. If I was a member of the Chicago Bears, I'd be cut or on waivers right now. I'm losing my skills. I'm not as good a shot. I have slower reflexes."
When the ducks came, the reflexes were fine, but the will was not. A solo redhead soared past the point, not 20 yards distant. Koch let him fly. Doesn't like that meat.
"I could have got him easy," he said.
Off to the left a handful of mergansers flapped.
"They look like the Concorde," Koch said of their wings.
When he was 5 years old, Koch fell in a marsh. He smelled and he was coated with icky stuff, but he has loved marshes ever since.
The wind prevented reaching his favorite marsh this day. A flock of ducks landed out of range on the water and battled upstream. It was like Sisyphus and the rock.
A solitary hen mallard landed in the midst of the decoys. When it lifted off, it paused, a gift target. But Koch did not feel like killing a hen.
When Koch picked up the decoys after three hours, they were coated with ice. He never fired his shotgun, never put Augie to work. But he saw some swans, and he could have shot some ducks.
The old duck hunter was satisfied.