Taxidermy IS Art

Taxidermy is art.  Anybody who has eaten at the Texas Road House near where I live has seen what bad taxidermy looks like; which demonstrates that doing taxidermy takes the skill of an artist.  Like all art, there are poor and better examples.  And like some other forms of art, it makes some people uncomfortable.
While it might be even be a bit vulgar, taxidermy art is no more distasteful in the wrong place than statues of naked people or a bunch of silly squiggly lines on some canvas.  Taxidermy is also one of the most participatory art forms.  It is one thing to have a van Gogh displayed on the wall, but totally more personal if Monet paints the lily pads in your own pond.

I just got my pronghorn antelope back from the taxidermist in Wyoming.  It looks great and was quickly mounted on the wall in my living room.

I've about reached the carrying capacity of that room, with several other mounts in my home office.   The story behind my pronghorn is retold here.  It is worthwhile retelling the tales behind all of my taxidermy, as the personal story accompanies the art finished by the taxidermist.

"November" 2003

I had been deer hunting on the same farm in Owen County, Kentucky for several years.  This was probably some of the most deer infested property I've ever hunted, but the number of mature bucks was fairly low as due to some specifics of the area, poaching was endemic (heart breaking that a near twin to this buck was poached from the same property the following year).
Finding the property wasn't easy in the dark so I skipped hunting opening morning and drove down during that time.  I got there a little before noon and let myself into the "gentleman farmer's" house as he had given me the key instead of tent camping in his yard.  Even though the middle of the day isn't terribly productive, I didn't want to sit around the house so I nestled into a small thicket of prickers to sit until the evening when I was planning to move to a much better spot in a tree stand.  The thicket overlooked an open area containing a pond, pasture and a few oaks that had shed many acorns.  After a short amount of time, I saw a truck crest the hill of the property across the road, followed a few minutes later by the buck coming up the hill in front of me - likely pushed by the other hunters going to lunch.
My jaw dropped when I saw the deer and I was totally unprepared.  I got my gun up as quick as I could and before he disappeared into the woods.  At the shot, the only instant reaction was running, but he dropped within about 20-yards.
Being my first very large, 10-point, symmetrical deer it was very special and I am glad that my first taxidermy mount was such a great deer.

"Mr. Goofy" 2005

2004 was a very tough year.  Work was terrible and I almost got fired for taking time off for deer hunting (the work I was doing wasn't all that important, but my boss' attitude was something needs to be done, even if it is wrong).  For whatever reason, the deer hunting was also terrible that year.  It is the only year I didn't get a deer while hunting on the farm in Owen County, Kentucky, missing a decent buck which was one of the few deer I even saw that year.  After the season, I decided the next deer I shot would be mounted no matter what, assuming it would be a doe to go along with my gorgeous 2003 buck.
I was hunting with a friend on his newly acquired farm, also in Owen County.  Opening morning came cold with a threat of heavy rain.  As it got light a moderate 6-point stomped toward me; I could hear him 100 yards away.  As he rounded the bend in front of me he looked up at my ladder stand and turned inside out getting out of there.  A few hours later this spike deer came up.  After 2004, I wasn't going to wait and shot him seeing he was a large-bodied deer.  I trailed him down hill and found him near the road.  By any measure he is not a specimen animal.  However, he was definitely an older deer.  His pathetic mismatched antlers were likely due to poor eating, due to a massive overbite he had.  When I had him mounted, I made sure the taxidermist kept the overbite, and he also skillfully created the underside of his upper jaw.

"Carolina" 2008

I had been hunting hogs a few times before 2008:  first in Texas in 2005 and 2007 in South Carolina.  I shot two small (and I do mean small) ones in 2005.  In 2007 I didn't shoot any, but liked the place enough that I was in the same place in 2008.  It was the last day of the hunt and I still hadn't seen anything I could shoot.  The property being hunted is owned by the very wealthy descendants of one of America's "barron" families.  Hogs are hunted on the end of the property that they don't use due to it being heavily populated with hogs and very swampy.  The part of the property near their house was seeing significant hog damage, so Rick was asked to take a few animals from that area, and I was put in a ladder stand there on that last night.
Rick had told me I was likely to see a sow who was missing an ear with two litters of piglets.  True enough, a sow came out early in the evening with two litters of piglets (she was actually missing both ears).  It was both difficult and fun to watch them for a couple hours.  Watching piglets root and spar is something every hunter should experience at least once.  As it got darker, they left and a short time later I saw another pig come out.  I could tell by the coloring that it wasn't the same sow so I carefully brought my gun up.  It was dark by this time and hard to see, but I wasn't too far away.  The lack of light plus shooting offhand after being on a slightly uncomfortable ladder stand for hours made shooting more difficult than it otherwise would have.  The shot was true, despite needing a short trailing job and a finishing round from Rick's .40 (as penance, I later sent Rick a box of home-rolled .40s).  She was an enormous sow, and one of the other hunters in camp christened her "Water Buffalo".  She was probably also the wild hog with the most fat on them that I have shot over the years.
Being my first large hog after several attempts, I wanted to get her mounted.  I decided this after she was being skinned so there was some repair needed, but the taxidermist did a great job.  Many sows are mounted as boars with fake tusks, since sows and boars generally look the same.  This didn't feel right to me so I had her mounted as she was - a sow with a closed mouth.

"Blade" 2009

It was the second night of this hunt (I think) and I was sitting on a very swampy tree stand called the "Feed Lot" on the same property where Carolina was taken in 2007.  I had seen many deer but it was getting dark and the deer had all left.  I heard "stomping" through the muck and new it wasn't a deer before seeing this hog come into the area.  It was a classic, off the shooting rail, clean head shot and he dropped into the mire.  He flopped around a bit, but was dead before he hit the ground.
He didn't look all that large, but was deceptively heavy at 235 pounds.  As this was my first large boar, I knew I wanted to have him mounted.  While caping him for the taxidermist, my knife hit something odd near his spine.  After further work on the carcass, it was revealed that he had an arrowhead and piece of cedar shaft from a traditional hunter that had been in camp a few weeks earlier.  This hunter had thought he had hit a small sow however, not a fairly large boar.
While cleaning him up at the taxidermist's studio, his coloring became more evident.  He wasn't the classic mean black boar, but the range of blonde to brown to nearly black make him a very interesting wild boar mount.  I'm not sure if it is true, but the split hairs he has could suggest a significant amount of European (Russian) genetics.

"Manni" 2009

Bear hunting was on my must-do list for a long time and in 2009 I finally got the chance up in Manitoba, Canada.  I prepared for it as much as I could and anticipated this hunt more than most.  As often happens, the weather plays a role.  While the forecast for that May week I was to be there was for temps in the 70s, things changed quickly and temperatures dropped to freezing and below for most of the week.  There were several other hunters and in camp and none of us were completely prepared for the frigid temperatures.
The cold weather shut bear movement down considerably.  I had seen several bears, including three cubs with mom who stayed in the area for quite some time.  It was a magical experience.  Several guys were able to connect with good bears though.
It was the second to last night and while having the time of my life (the fishing was phenomenal), I really did want to get a bear.  I was on a stand called "Gas Can" that was nearly flooded due to recently passed rains.  I had been sitting most of the evening and the shadows started to play tricks on me as it got dark.  I said to myself, "I wish one of those dark spots would be a bear."  And, one of them was.  How such a large animal can stealthily move is a little scary.  I watched her for a while and knew she was a small bear.  But, being near the end of the hunt, I decided she would do.  One shot, a short run and he died just out of sight after clearing a large deadfall tree.
She was a small bear, but I was happy.  I had the taxidermy done by a large shop Winnipeg.  Small animals are harder to work with than large ones, but the job they didn't wasn't that great.  She is missing the spark that makes great taxidermy great.  But, as my first bear I 'm glad I got her mounted, even if she does look small compared to my other mounts.

"Snowball" 2010

A heinous snow storm was rolling in the day before I was to leave for hog hunting in 2010.  I got to work and tried to concentrate on my job, but kept turning to look at the radar and weather forecast.  Things continued to deteriorate.  When my boss got in, I told him I was taking the rest of the day off to get ahead of things.  After driving home and furiously packing, I left - forgetting a few things in the process.  After a night in a cheap hotel, I got to camp very early and was able to take a decent meat hog on an extra day of hunting.
The next evening we went out and I was sitting on the "hunt club" stand.  I saw many deer that evening until they all looked to my right before bolting away to the left as it got dark.  A few minutes later the reason why appeared in the form of what was obviously a large black boar hog.  He owned the area and slowly meandered around.  It didn't take long for me to get things lined up and hit him with head shot.  He dropped at the shot and flopped for a few seconds like hogs will do after being brained.  As it got dark, I got out of the tree stand and walked about half way up to him.  Seeing he was dead, I turned around to meet back at the rendezvous point.  We drove up to get him after everyone met up and he as gone.  Oh my.
This was one of the few real intimidating experiences I've had while hunting (the other being the sow bear with cubs with sitting staring at me from the base of my tree).  At this point it was absolutely pitch black and we were trailing a large boar into very thick brush.  Rick was a few yards ahead and saw him.  We heard two shots from his .40 followed by the slide rack, "Someone get up here and bring me a f*ing gun!"  Nathan handed Rick his .357 revolver.  Click.  Click.  "What the f* is wrong with this thing?"  I was carrying Rachel's Lady Smith which finished things quickly at that point.  Rick had forgotten to reload his .40 and only had two rounds while Nathan's "trusty" .357 had a bent firing pin.  Hauling out the very large boar was a lot of work.  My shot had been about as good as it gets, hitting the base of the skull and brain which should have dropped him instantly for good; it just shows what tough critters large hogs are.
While I already had a good boar taxidermy mount, this pig had it all.  Very woolly.  Huge head.  Giant shoulders, little tiny butt.  I had to have him mounted.  He was probably the fastest turn around taxidermy animal I've ever gotten since the taxidermist agreed to finish the mount quickly so that I could pick him up a few months later during my turkey hunt.

Turkey 2010

It was the second full day of turkey hunting.  We hadn't seen much the first day despite good conditions and made a ground blind of sorts at the end of a fence row point where we had seen two gobblers the morning before.  We got into the ground blind before light and waited.  As it got light we started hearing some turkeys including some gobbling.  Rick did only a little bit of lite calling, letting the decoys do most of the work initially.  Rick was pretty familiar with these birds and so was expecting them to come at us from behind us to the left and that was the way I was set up with my shotgun.  We could hear turkeys getting closer by the sounds of gobbling, and soon enough drumming as well, but it sounded like it was coming from the right.

With the sounds getting very close, Rick (who was on my right) whispered for me to peer around him to see if anything was there.  I stretched and craned my neck but couldn't see anything and told him so.  He looked out a little farther than I could and looked back at me, pissed off and tersely whispered, "He's right there!".

We watched the gobbler move slowly from behind us on our right in full strut.  It is best not to shoot a turkey in full strut as there is a strong likelihood of destroying a lot of the meat, if not the bird itself.  He told me to get my gun over that way which I did as smoothly and slowly as I could.  

"Are you on him?"

"My barrel is right by your head." I replied.

Rick looked to his left and whispered, "I've had worse."

"I need his head up."

He very, very softly touched his slate call, making just the slightest purr.  As he did this, the turkey's head jumped up, giving me the shot I was looking for.  A swarm of pellets came out of the gun.  The turkey flopped around a bit before it was all over.

Of all the hunting I have done, those few minutes with that turkey so close, trying to get my gun over at it, being close to Rick's head - those were some of the most exciting minutes of hunting I've ever had.

We dropped off the turkey at the same taxidermist that had finished my large boar from earlier in the year.  The taxidermist had chicken, and they were very interested in the turkey, even pecked at.  I was able to bring the turkey home the next year while wild boar hunting.

Bear 2011

This was my second bear hunt and at the same place as the first.  It was a totally different year and I had seen many bear, including a few really nice ones.  I was sitting on the same stand where the previous evening, another hunter was sitting just to take pictures as he had already gotten a bear.  He had seen and gotten a few pictures of a really big furry bear.

I didn't see much during most of the afternoon, but enjoyed being there.  It was right near the rapids on the river and the sound was somewhat mesmerizing.  As it was just starting to get dark, I saw a bear come out of the brush.  This may not make sense, but I knew it was a small bear; yet, for some reason I just thought at that moment I really should see a big bear.  I brought my rifle up and shot it.  As it ran away, I thought, "Gosh, I just shot another small bear."   

In all reality, the bear wasn't that small, but it wasn't even close to the biggest bear I saw on that hunting trip.  This trip occurred after moving to the new house, but before selling the old so money was a pretty real issue.  The hide was very nice and the bear looked good so I ended up deciding to have this one made as a rug.  My local taxidermist is a good guy and does great work, but he often takes quite a long time.  Treating the hide for bear rugs is something he sublets out (I was aware of this) but after my bear went out, the place that had it went belly up.  Eventually, my bear made it to another place for this, but the time between shooting the bear and getting it up on the wall was over two years.  However, the result is really nice.  And, if there is a silver lining to not shooting the biggest scratchiest bear in the woods, it is that a really large bear would not have worked well where I wanted to put this - on the wall over the basement steps.

So each of the taxidermy mounts I have had done have a great story behind them.  The mounts themselves are both the ultimate in participatory art and a reminder of great times I have had while hunting.  There are a couple more I would like to have eventually, but I will, of course, need to wait until after I hunt them, as buying taxidermy is like buying a portrait of someone else's child.  

I am not a trophy hunter though.  I have no interest in going after the biggest, freakishly large examples of any species that many hunters lust after.  What I am most interested in are classic, good examples of what the species looks like.  While I think a bull elk is majestic, or a moose is amazing, any kind of mount of them would overwhelm any room of my house.  So if I ever hunt elk or moose, it will likely be cow elk or moose.  All the fun and experience, and potentially more meat and less cost. 

Regardless of my or anyone's motivations, it really doesn't matter.  Taxidermy doesn't justify hunting and hunting doesn't justify taxidermy because neither really requires justification.

What taxidermy is though, is an art form where involvement is required that also serves as a great reminder of awesome adventures.