AllOtsego.com: Decoys Harken Back To ‘Market Gunning’ Days

Decoys Harken Back To ‘Market Gunning’ Days

11/13/09

BURLINGTON FLATS

A century ago – “the days of flocks so big they would block out the sun” – “market gunning” was a lucrative occupation everywhere, including Otsego, Canadarago and other local lakes.
Decoy artist Jonathan Dowdall has a crafted model of a “punt gun,” which required a quarter-pound of power to fire a half-pound of shot.
The punt was double-bowed to more smoothly respond to the big gun’s recoil. The hunters would lie in the bow, quietly approaching their prey. Then, “bang.”
Around 1900, the peak of market gunning, the common wage was $1 a day. The hunters could realize $1.10 for a two-bird brace, and bring home 80 birds a night.
Teddy Roosevelt’s conservation movement made people realize the supply wasn’t without end, and laws protecting game birds were enacted in the 19-teens. Nonetheless, the gunners continued surreptitiously, selling their harvest to the resort hotels in Sharon Springs, Richfield Springs and Cooperstown.
Chased by conservations officers, they would commonly sink their boats, returning to retrieve them when the heat was off.
Dowdall said a friend of his, a diver, found one such punt at the bottom of Otsego Lake near Sunken Island, testimony to days gone by.

Labels: 11-20-09