12th Open European Taxidermy Championship • HungExpo • Budapest, Hungary 

Held in conjunction with One With Nature World of hunting and Nature World Exhibition, Sep. 25–Oct. 14, 2021

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I have lived my entire life in Louisiana, and regularly have alligators in our pond and on occasion in our back yard. In my state if you live near a river, creek, or for that matter, a large ditch, pond, or swamp of any size, you will sooner or later will see an alligator. In the southern half of Louisiana the possibility of encountering a gator increases five fold because of the low flat land and numerous bayous and cypress swamps. Living in a state populated with gators does not make one an expert on this reptile’s anatomical features, mannerisms of how they stand, walk, swim or lie in a relaxed position on mud or ground. In fact, most of those folks who encounter a gator keep their distance and remotely observe one of the most intriguing reptiles of North America.

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There are for animal mounts—a bobcat, a rainbow trout, a drake pintail, and a whitetail deer, all perfectly preserved to their natural state. One thing remains before sending these critters off to clients: adding a natural habitat. Realist rocks resembling their former stomping (or swimming) grounds would being these creatures back to life. This is where commercial taxidermists hit a crossroad: what type of rock bases to use? There are so many choices. Pre-made rock bases are detailed using colors, textures, and vegetation with multiple options available. They are ideal for when there is not enough time to build a base. Then there are also unfinished, pre-formed rocks that can be colored and finished with habitat. Rock panels, for example, are perfect for large mounts.

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White crappie are fun and popular fish to paint. The secret to painting a crappie is to apply layers of pearls, silver, and shimmer colors on top of each other to give the reflective effect that is desired. The main difference between painting a real skin-mounted fish and a replica is the real fish skin has the natural markings to follow, so you need to apply the colors lighter than with a replica. On a replica, you need to use good reference to create the markings as close to the real thing as possible. One trick I have used over the years is…

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Eyes must convey the attitude depicted by the body, as well as each expressive part of its face, neck height, and tail position. In the minds of some artists, they first envision the eye expression they want to convey, building the rest around that attitude or mood, which becomes the theme of the entire piece, habitat included.

As we go through this article, notice how many more details are seen on the shorter-haired cats as apposed to the fluffy ones. Compare a fully primed Canadian lynx to an extremely short-haired ocelot. Consider the difficulty factor when choosing a competition specimen, as the wow of a fully-furred lynx might outweigh the difficulty factor of a short-haired bobcat. Keeping in mind the importance of the silhouette (refer to Issue 140, Article 1), a bobcat is very distinguishable from other cats. Much of this uniqueness comes from a generally round-shaped head with more rounded ears, shorter ruffs (long hair coming off the sides of the head), and shorter ear tuffs (the cluster of black hairs that come off the back of each ear at the tip) as a comparison to its sometimes very close look-alikes of the various lynx species. The bobcat head should not be a Mr. Potato Head where you get to mix any components.

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