Bruce Urben, shown here with his winning decoy in Wisconsin’s 2018 Decoy Carving Contest
By Bruce Ross, Executive Director bruceross@wi.rr.com
This article originally appeared in Wisconsin Waterfowl Association’s May, 2021 Newsletter edition.
WWA’s President, Bruce Urben’s, decoy carvings are in some pretty rarified air. His scaup drake placed third at Ward’s World Championship on the east coast this past weekend. Robin Oliver from New Jersey placed first and Bob Umphlett from Chincoteague Virginia was second in the category of Single Gunner. Both Robin and Bob are widely considered to be extraordinary carvers.
Bruce’s winning Scaup
This decoy is a brother of the scaup Urben donated to Delta Waterfowl for their celebrity carver hunt (only 12 carvers selected) in 2020 on the Bay of Green Bay. The decoys will be featured in Delta’s magazine this fall.
Bruce not only carves a pretty mean decoy, he writes this newsletter’s The Decoy Corner articles – appropriately. And when he’s not in the workshop, he leads WWA as our volunteer President, chairs the Education Committee, is a member of the Policy Committee, coordinates management of WWA’s Abrams property, strongly supports the Green Bay Chapter’s banquet and shooting events, and runs the logistics team for the upcoming Waterfowl Hunter’s EXPO. And I’m sure I missed some things!
For those of you (like me) who have snagged one or more of Urben’s decoys that he’s generously donated to a WWA auction, or by some other means, hang onto it – its investment value is rising!!!