Mallard Duck Decoy From Maine

A well-carved and nicely painted decoy, this mallard drake is in excellent condition. Made from a solid piece of white pine, the duck has many lifelike details: the beak with its nail (tip on the end) and the nares (nostrils); deep green head with a white neck ring; the speculum (the blue patch on the feathers); and excellent painting on the tail that mimics its unique curly black tail feather known as a "drake feather." The carver used stain as well as paint, so the beautiful wood grain shows.

This decoy was made by The Decoy Shop in Freeport, Maine, founded in Freeport in the 1940's by George Soule, who sold some of his decoys to L.L. Bean and Abercrombie & Fitch in New York. In 1977, Soule sold his shop to Hargy Heap III. The Decoy Shop incised stamp is almost completely missing on this duck's underside, but we have another Decoy Shop decoy with the full mark and we've included it in one of our photos. The full mark shown has a copy of H. Heap III's signature and that's probably the right dating for this mallard... 1980's.

The decoy measures 12 inches long, 4 1/2 inches across the breast, 5 1/4 inches tall to the top of its head and it weighs 1 pound. Great display decoy and a nice gift for the collector, decorator...or yourself.

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