A homemade shallow-draft wooden duck skiff
gives an Ohio hunter access to secret honey holes.
DIY Boat is a
Waterfowler’s Work of Art
ANTHONY FUSSELL OWNED a
16-foot johnboat that did not give
him access to the places he was itch-
ing to hunt. As he watched ducks
heading for shallow areas that the
armada of hunters with similar boats
could not reach, he made the deci-
sion to sell it and buy a shallow draft
boat. However, when that deal went
awry, he built his own boat.
“I had to have a shallow draft boat,
so I started searching for something
online,” Fussell said. “A guy was sell-
ing a MOmarsh fiberglass boat for
$800. We made the deal over the
phone. But, when I got ready to pick
it up, he was avoiding my calls. I fig-
ured he sold it to someone else.”
That left a bad taste in his mouth,
so he decided to build a boat. He
found plans for a KARA Hummer at
myduckboatplans.com.
“I had never built a boat, but hav-
ing a family, I have limited funds,” he
said. “I figured I could build exactly
what I needed and save money.”
Fussell is a 37-year-old FedEx main-
tenance technician from Granville,
Ohio. A friend, Brian Huff, introduced
him to duck hunting 11 years ago.
The public waters he hunts produce
mallards, wood ducks, wigeon, teal
and other ducks along with Canada
geese. He sets out two Mojo Mallards
and 12 Avian-X and GHG mallard,
wood duck and wigeon decoys. He
made an X-shaped steel spreader for
a jerk string rig that scissors open. It
holds four decoys attached to the ends
with carabiners. The string ties to an
eyebolt that creates the center pivot
point. He stokes his Browning Maxus
with Hevi-Shot BBs.
“I had never built a boat before,” he
said. “I bought the plans for $35 and
they came in the mail. The paperback
binder had step-by-step directions,
with templates for the hull ribs, bow
and stern, and curvature of the top
deck and bottom hull. I just tweaked
the plans a little by widening the
stern and adding a transom so I could
mount a motor.”
The framework is one-inch pine,
which Fussell bought at Home Depot.
A 1”x6”x14’ board provided enough
wood to fashion the two gunwales
and keel. The ribs were shaped from
1”x6” pine boards. The 1” pine cock-
pit combing extends about 9"above
the ribs and is toenailed to the tops
of the ribs.
Exterior screws left over from
building a deck were used to fit the
skeleton together. To enable shapingthe contours of the top, bottom and
gunwale center strips, Fussell left the
wood out in the rain to wet it. The
skin is ¼” flooring underlayment.
Before screwing the skin to the frame,
he wet the exterior with warm water
from a sprayer bottle. He also applied
Liquid Nails adhesive before tighten-
ing the screws, a process that required
eight tubes.
Two 1”x1” oak runners were added
to the bottom about six inches either
each side of the centerline. They
were bolted to the hull, with the
heads recessed and dimples covered
with wood putty. The runners help
the boat track true when the boat is
underway and help to protect the bot-
tom from damage when it is on the
water and during transportation.
Fussell provided the boatBoats & Blinds
36 36 WILDFOWL Magazine | September 2019WILDFOWL Magazine | September 2019 wildfowlmag.comwildfowlmag.com