I have thought about this. Seema like a tedious project, but one that would be very rewarding.

Did you pick up a kit somewhere?

Can't help you here. But looks good!

Super impressed.

My grandfather was a master carver; starting way back with decoys (while in the USMC) before settling into songbirds and waterfowl. In his later years he primarily power carved. Unfortunately, he passed away in '01 so while I've dabbled (and am saving for some new pfeil gouges) it's been based on the only carving-related wisdom he ever relayed to me: "just carve away everything that doesn't look like a duck."

Got a friend that is VERY into carving he is in the rosenberg area, let me know if you want his contact info.

Yes it's Mike H. Dude has some awesome stuff.

Have a couple on the shelf that great grandpa carved in the eighteen hundreds.

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Got a friend that is VERY into carving he is in the rosenberg area, let me know if you want his contact info.

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You don't mean me?

I'm only on my second bird, but am using cork bodies, third coast. Carved a bluebill from an instructional video (Willie's Duck Blind) then a mallard that I will paint as a mottled duck. Bought a band saw in order to cut out my own blanks instead of ordering the blanks from another party. I have that same book of plans that is in your picture that I'm going to use going forward.

Edit: The aforementioned Mike does have some good decoys and is a good guy.

Just carve teal blocks, third. Is the short band saw height the reason you are going with the two piece body or are you hollowing it for weight? Your bird looks good, though. Much better than my heads.

I haven't carved with anyone. Talked to the guy Only mentioned some. If you have a mutual friend, I'm sure he wouldn't mind talking to you about it. He's into it and my impression is that he'd like to see more folks in the area take it up. Not a ton of carvers around here, and I guess that Meitzen (Richmond) was the only one of note.

No talent for this but I do appreciate those that do....

Don Gomez from Houma, La. I bought it well over twenty years ago before he got famous. He later started carving for people in that area that wanted a "collection of birds." In the early 2000's he had carved something like 150 or so for the Governor of Louisiana. Hard to tell from a photo but the feathers are carved.

You've got a live duck in your house.

The houston area woodcarvers club meets at Bayland community center on the third Saturday of every month and they have several bird carvers that attend.
http://www.houstonareawoodcarvers.com/

So clearly sunchaser's isn't meant to be used in a spread but are y'all carving blocks for use or decoration? Either way it's pretty cool.

Now that hunting season and spring break are over, I'm planning to start up again this weekend.