A Stellar Southern Decoy Collection Goes on Sale this Week

The finest decoy collection ever assembled in the South was too big to sell all at once, says Copley Fine Art Auctions decoy specialist Colin McNair, who helped auction the first half of the Peter J. Muller Jr. collection at the Southeastern Wildlife Exposition in Charleston, South Carolina, last year. The late Muller, a Louisiana-born, Atlanta-based veterinarian and sportsman, collected decoys throughout the South and beyond. His circa 1920 swan by the Virginia carver Charles Birch sold for a whopping $210,000 last year, and “session two is set up to be every bit as exciting,” McNair says. The two-day auction will take place over livestream beginning February 19. The collection includes a feeding brant and curlew that the heralded Nathan F. Cobb Jr. carved on Cobb Island, Virginia, in the 1880s; a standout hollow hissing goose from Chincoteague, Virginia’s Ira D. Hudson; and a canvasback pair from Maryland’s famed Ward Brothers. Day two of the auction, on February 20, brings items from collectors and artists around the South, including a circa 1890 Lee Dudley bluebill hen from Knotts Island, North Carolina. “It’s petite and refined, and it’s one of the sweetest birds ever carved in the Carolinas,” McNair says. Absentee, telephone, and live online bidding are available. Click here for more auction details and to see the entire catalog.