Last Updated on 7/3/2009

Published on 12/17/2008
Written by Jason Lesley

The Caines legend continues to grow.
Carvers Jerry and Roy Caines brought home five awards from the Core Sound Decoy Festival in Harkers Island, N.C., this month and are turning their attention to the third annual Winyah Bay Heritage Festival scheduled Jan. 17-18.
Jerry and Roy are grandsons of one of the most famous names in decoy carving, Hucks Caines. A 1910 mallard decoy made by Hucks fetched $189,500 at an auction in New York City run by Sotheby’s — and the collector who bought it got a bargain.
The Caines brothers included Hucks, Sawney, Pluty, Ball and Bob and they lived at a settlement called Caines Village, fronting on Muddy Bay and facing Pumpkinseed Island.
In 1905, Bernard Baruch bought a group of plantations that included Caines Village and posted the land against trespassing. In rebellion, the brothers’ hunting (poaching, Baruch claimed) increased.
In his autobiography, Baruch recalled apprehending Hucks Caines one morning with 166 black ducks and mallards in his possession. The Caines brothers sold the birds in Georgetown as their livelihood.
Baruch realized he was in a no-win situation, so he hired Hucks as a hunting guide and caretaker. All the Caines brothers were eventually employed by Baruch with the exception of Ball, who never accepted his offer.
Among Caines decoys in personal collections are some branded with “B.M.B.” for Bernard Mannes Baruch, and these are considered to be from his personal rig of decoys, reportedly made by Hucks. A boatshed at Hobcaw, where many Caines decoys were stored, burned in 1951, making the remainder all the more valuable.
Only about 50 of 550 original Caines decoys remain today. Most fell victim to fire, neglect, termites and powder-post beetles. And some ended up being dragged around the yard by Roy and Jerry as toys. The surviving decoys, including the Caines trademark “snakey-neck” model are prized collectors’ items.
Jerry remembers his father having 12 fish boxes filled with decoys under his house in Georgetown. Their only frame of reference regarding the value of a handmade South Carolina decoy was that the Ward Brothers had sold them for 10 cents apiece in 1920.
The brothers, who live on West Virginia Road, Georgetown, discovered they had the family talent a few years ago when they entered the Ward World Wildfowl Carving Competition in Ocean City, Md., and took a second place with a pintail drake and a third with a canvasback.
Encouraged by that success, the Caines Boys — they didn’t want to be the Caines  Brothers, a name already taken by their ancestors — entered the Core Sound Decoy Festival at Harkers Island, N.C., and won first, second and third in the open division last year.
This year’s winners were a drake that took two thirds, including Best of Category, a canvasback that won a first place in species and a second in Best of Category and a pintail “floatie” that took a first place.
Jerry and Roy and making miniature swans for the Winyah Bay Heritage Festival in January, and they have started on a black duck decoy like their grandfather made. They say it will take two weeks of carving and a week of painting to complete the bird, just in time for the festival.
Jerry and Roy are also working on a new songbird, a blue jay. Their first effort, a pair of cardinals, won a first-place blue ribbon and a third-place Best in Show ribbon in competition. Last year, they carved a 28-pound American eagle with a six-foot wingspan.