Meadowlark Gallery: The Artist Biographies


Roger Fliger
(1933-1992)

"The Turtler"


John Batts and Roger Fliger

This Mourning Dove decoy was hand carved and designed by Roger Fliger. The decoy body is of sugar pine and then hand painted. A tea cup hook was placed in the back of the decoy so that the hunter could hang it along with several others on a barbed wire fence. The hunter then would sit a short distance away from the decoys in anticipation of those fast winged beauties. Roger believed that the hunter could never have too many decoys.

Roger Fliger was a sportsman from his early days in his home state of Iowa with its conservation department to his ten years of work in Helena and in Great Falls as the district information officer with the old Montana Fish and Game Department. For twenty one years he was the Regional Supervisor for the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks in Billings, Montana. An avid sportsman, Roger did not restrict his interests to a particular species of birds, animals, or fish. Beyond his sporting interests, Roger was also an avid decoy collector for many years. He was often asked to display his collection at many events but they dampened his enthusiasm when an attendee thought they were just picking up a "little duck." What followed was that they accidentally dropped the "little duck" on the floor, chipping the beak. What the attendee accidentally dropped was a very fine collectible Mason Factory Decoy.

View high resolution images of works by Roger Fliger when available.