The Outdoors

By Scott Rall, Outdoors Columnist

This will be year number two for me at the National Fish Decoy Association gathering in Perham, Minn., on April 14, 15 and 16. It is hard to describe just how cool this event is. If you are a decoy carver you will certainly know what happens over these 3 days. To the ones left out I will try to give you a feel for this one-of-a-kind event.

The National Fish Decoy Association is the largest recognized entity in the fish decoy arena. Carvers from all over the United States will come to this show and enter into many of the different classes. Wins at this high level go a long way to making their decoys much more valuable.

I am serving as a judge in 12 or 13 of the 25 different classes displayed this weekend. Each fish class has different rules and different parameters. Most of them have a minimum or maximum length. Some are judged as folk art. Other classes might be ice spearing heritage focused. With 25 different classes and as many different judging criteria you get to see such a wide variety of stuff it will blow your mind.

We are all familiar with the fish species that call Minnesota home, but how many of them have you actually caught? There are categories for northern pike, crappies and perch. We all know what they look like. How about rainbow trout, char, steelhead and even a few categories for waterfowl. They have categories for even the smallest of fish like darters and the like.

If you know not one single thing about spearing and the decoys used you will be overwhelmed when you walk into the now sold out exhibitors arena. Standing in one spot you will be able to lay your eyes on more than 3,000-5,000 different and one of kind master pieces. The craftsmanship and attention to detail is incredible. There are paint finishes I did not think were possible.

They also have categories where no natural materials can be used. Exhibitors and competitors will cast and paint epoxy resin designs and compete in those very specialty classes.

You can look back more than 100 years of spearing history at this display. They have some stuff that looks like it came to Minnesota in a covered wagon. Spears, ice saws, ice spuds, old photos and every method to attract a pike into a spear hole will be on display. My biggest issue is that I normally burn through the money I brought for the entire weekend in about two to three hours.

If there was one word to describe this event it would have to be two words. Craftsmanship and attention to detail. I guess that was more than one word. As a contestant you can enter as many classes as you want and some of them are called purchase classes. The entity or individual that puts up the prize money for a particular class is then able to take home the first and sometimes second place finishers.

There is an awards banquet held on Saturday evening and anyone can buy a ticket to this event. The thing that surprised me the most is how some of these carvers can enter many different classes with different judging criteria and still win on a consistent basis. I can see getting really good at one thing, but how do you get so good as to be able to win across such a wide spectrum of fish species and judging standards.

There is no doubt that many of these competitors are on the upper end of the age range but there was one young gal I know who entered for the first time ever and won an award. Her name is Melissa Shockman from North Dakota. I hope to meet up with her again this year. She used to work for Pheasants Forever, which is where I met her initially

There are no big shots or hot shots with big attitudes at this show from what I have seen. I have seen the oldest and most successful carvers sitting with the newbies and intermediates helping them fine tune their crafts to help everyone become a better carver. How often do you see someone helping and training their own future competitors? Not very many times I will say from my experience. This is such an unusual event you should try to attend. Last year it rained the whole time but the weather is looking up for next weekend. I am sure there will be a few beers to be found in Perham as well.

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If you have any questions, reach out to me at scottarall@gmail.com.