Local taxidermist explains his art
Taxidermy involves a lot more than just stuffing a dead animal. For many taxidermists it is a very intricate art.
Kevin J. Petersen, taxidermist and owner of Autumn Pride Taxidermy, said he has been doing taxidermy for 25 years.
People bring in animals they have killed while hunting and he skins and fleshes the animals’ hides. He then turns the eyes, nose, lips, and ears inside out, salt-dries them, and sends them to a commercial tannery to be processed. When the hides are returned, he soaks them to hydrate them. He then orders a form that says how the client wants the mount to look. After that he taxes, or moves the skin around the mount.
“There is a lot of detail in taxidermy. It is really an art form. A lot of people like to call it wildlife artistry,” Petersen said.
He said taxidermy is a very time-consuming process. It takes from six months to one year to mount a hide for a customer.
He buys the eyes, teeth and tongues for his animals from supply companies. The eyes are made of glass and hand painted by artists in the field. The teeth are molded and cast from real animal jaws and reproduced in plastic. The tongues are also cast and made of rubber.
“Most people, when they think of taxidermy, think of a lot of brains and red meat, but the only thing we use from the animal is the skin and antlers. Everything else is artificial,” Petersen said.
There is a large demand for good taxidermists because many of them have bad reputations, he said. They get a lot of work from customers by charging cheap rates and then get burned out and can’t finish their work. When that happens, their customers lose their money and their trophy.
He said he only does taxidermy part time so he limits himself to about 10 to 15 customers a year. He also said he prefers to not have it as a full-time job.
“You can’t be in this for the money. It is hard work,” Petersen said.
He said most good taxidermists have college degrees in business or wildlife art and some even have master’s degrees. He also said some of the best taxidermists in the world are good flat artists or sculptors.
“In order to be a good taxidermist you have to have artistic ability, understand animal anatomy and be a good craftsman,” Petersen said. “Every hunter in the world wants to be a taxidermist, but most don’t have enough ambition, time and dedication.”
He said even though he sometimes has customers ask him to preserve their pets, he won’t do it because there is too much emotion involved. A person is closer to his pets than to wild animals.
“A person knows how their pet looks, they know the kind of look it gives you when it is cuddled up in your lap and that is hard to reproduce. I think it is just looking for trouble for a taxidermist to try, because when the person gets their pet back it probably won’t be the way they remembered it,” Petersen said.
He said his job is interesting because he loves to hunt and he loves wildlife; his job allows him to see the wildlife that comes into his shop.
“This is the opportunity to be able to preserve something,” Petersen said. “There is so much satisfaction in seeing my work completed.”
He said his shop rate is $38 an hour. He charges $450 for the average deer head, $2,100 for cougars, $1,500 for wolves, and $1,200 for buffalo. He said buffaloes are especially difficult to do. They’re expensive to have tanned because they have a lot of hair and a thick hide. Most taxidermists who have worked on one don’t ever do another one, and if they do, they really raise the price on them.
“I want to promote the art and get away from all of the old stereotypes,” Petersen said. “[Taxidermy] went from being a hobby to a vocation. It gets in your blood and it’s hard to stop doing it,” Petersen said.
For more information on Petersen’s taxidermy call (435) 245-4893.
–erina@cc.usu.edu