The Celebration of 100 Years of The Pattersquash Gunners Association
USB Media Package Featuring All 3 Documentaries
DVD now available $25
Almost 4-hours long, this video features seven “grand old gunners” sharing their tales and expertise – and hundreds of vintage photos in 18 chapters. Just like a book, you can take in a chapter (or 3 or 4) at a sitting.
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The Black Duck is the premiere puddle duck along much of the Atlantic tidewater and has always been paramount to our waterfowl hunters. As Van Campen Heilner wrote in his classic A Book on Duck Shooting: “Long Island isn’t a state but I always like to think of it as the 49th State and its state duck should certainly be the Black Duck and nothin’ else but.” This grand species will be celebrated in an exhibit and documentary film called ON THE FALLING TIDE ~ The story of traditional Black Duck gunning on the South Shore of Long Island.
Beginning in Jamaica Bay to the west and traveling east to Shinnecock Bay, the exhibit will describe the haunts and habits of this famously wary bird. Retired Ducks Unlimited Regional Director Craig Kessler and former NYSDEC Waterfowl Biologist Steve Sanford have assembled a team of experienced duck hunters to assist with this effort. Together, they have been collecting stories, photographs, decoys, gear and even boats. The special exhibit will showcase many of the different ways Black Ducks have been – and still are – pursued along the South Shore. In addition to numerous decoys, the Decoy Collectors display will include vintage vessels and gear. Our newest DVD will play on a big screen and will feature interviews with veteran gunners and hundreds of images.
As always, more than 50 vendor tables will feature antique decoys, sporting art, and other collectibles for viewing and purchase.
CONTACTS:
Craig Kessler
516-639-8480
Steve Sanford
518-677-5064
Vendors should contact Tim Sieger at 631-537-0153
When Broadbill Was King On Great South Bay
DVD now available $25
The history of market hunting for waterfowl has been told many times, yet the era that followed the demise of sinkboxes in the mid-1930s is poorly documented. For the four decades following, Long Island's Great South Bay still held hundreds of thousands of Greater Scaup (aka Broadbill) each fall and winter. The many guides who had first hunted for the market and then later "took out parties" of sportsmen still hunted this grand bird. Their big broadbill rigs had a large cabin boat to serve as the tender, often an open stool boat to carry upwards of 150 decoys, and a "scooter" replaced the battery or sinkbox as the open water blind. Gunners stayed warm on the tender - often around a stove with a hot mug of coffee or clam chowder - watching the rig while awaiting their turn in the scooter. This year's Show will celebrate this exceptional era in American waterfowling – which many Long Islanders can still recall from firsthand experience.
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CONTACTS:
Craig Kessler
516-639-8480
Steve Sanford
518-677-5064
Vendors should contact Tim Sieger at 631-537-0153
