Big Horn Show showcases taxidermy skills

Bragging rights, family memories, the hunt of a lifetime, the fish of your dreams – these are the types of incentives that trigger visits to a taxidermist.

The humble profession of immortalizing wildlife is at the root of the Big Horn Outdoor Recreation Show, which started 55 years ago as a gathering of hunters comparing big-game trophies.

The Big Horn Show has expanded to include all sorts of outdoor hobbies and sports, but the skills of taxidermists will continue to be on display in virtually every corner of the Spokane Fair and Expo Center on Thursday through Sunday.

Taxidermists, like most artists, have interests that are satisfied by the craft rather than good pay for long, tedious hours of labor.

They have a curiosity for critter anatomy and body parts similar to a master mechanic’s obsession with restoring classic cars.

“I’ve been interested in taxidermy since I was 10 and went hunting with my grandfather,” said James Keeling of Keeling Taxidermy in Reardan.

Keeling recalls a day in which he shot a squirrel and impressed his grandpa with his improving hunting skills. “He thought that was a big moment that should be commemorated,” Keeling recalled. “He said, ‘You should mount it.’

“So I skinned it and did the best I could using the materials I had: basically toilet paper and salt,” he said. “When I was finished it looked just like a real – hot dog.”

Although his day job is at Eastern State Hospital, Keeling has pursued taxidermy seriously for two decades.

“I took a four-month course from Knopp Taxidermy in the 1990s and was licensed in 2007,” he said.

“I was always fascinated by taxidermy. When I was a kid and we’d go to an outdoors store, I always found my way back to look at the mounts.

“I’d shoot a deer and keep the head as long as I could just to look at it and study the detail. I wanted to preserve them. I respected them.

“I continued to learn through magazines and catalogues, soaking up as much how-to information as I could.

“You’re always evolving and learning. It’s hands on,” he said, comparing the work of stitching skins, setting legs and forming ears and eyes to the work of orthopedists and plastic surgeons. “The more you do, the better you get.”

Years ago, taxidermists built their own forms for different species out of fiberglass. Nowadays forms are purchased from specialists who produce sculpted manikins with detailed musculature.

“I like altering the forms rather than using them right out of the box,” Keeling said.

Just back from the tannery, capes from bull elk were hanging on the wall of his shop behind his home.

Some hunters are skilled enough to skin capes off the skulls, but in most cases taxidermists prefer to cape the trophies themselves to make sure details, such as around the eyes and gums, are preserved and skins are properly scraped.

“There’s a lot of work to do on these after the tanning,” he said pointing the thick ragged looking skin around elk’s mouth. “After I rehydrate and stretch the skin to fit the form, that all has to be scraped until it’s paper thin.”

Depending on the pose the customer wants, Keeling might have to change leg forms or carve and fill to adjust and balance the anatomy of the form and then stretch, tuck, sew, tack and paint to a lifelike result.

A taxidermist is part hunter and naturalist as well as a sculptor and artist. “It gets very interesting when you’re down to the details in the muscles,” he said. “And when you paint the mouth and nose, you have to tend the paint after it’s applied because it shrinks and changes as it dries.”

Deer are the regional staple for taxidermy. “You get pretty fast with deer because you work with so many of them,” he said. “But a lion, bobcat, otter – you’re not seeing that many of them. So you have to slow down until you get a few under your belt. If you get in a hurry, it will show in your work.”

Regardless of the species, the goal is a perfectly lifelike finished product.

“You’re dealing with guys who bring their trophy in and they put their trust in you,” Keeling said. “It’s a lot of pressure. You want to give them a good mount in a reasonable turnaround.”

Wolves are the newest trophy species on the block, as protections were lifted in 2011 and the species was opened to hunting and trapping in Idaho.

Keeling has mounted his first wolf for his shop’s display booth at the Big Horn Show.

“The wolf is protected in Washington, but the skin came from the trapper who provided his license numbers and all the paperwork; I keep it all in my records,” he said, noting that taxidermists regularly open their books to wildlife enforcement agents.

Compared with thousands of deer and elk harvested each year, hunters and trappers kill only a couple hundred wolves in Idaho. “They’re smart, challenging to hunt and they make an eye-catching mount, so hunters consider them a prize worth taking to a taxidermist,” Keeling said.

Hunters pay around $550 for a shoulder-mount deer up to $2,200 for a life-size mount of a deer or wolf.

Keeling posed the deep-chested wolf in his display standing over a deer it supposedly had killed. The wolf’s front feet are positioned downhill from the rear legs, forming a curve in the animal’s back. “I avoid doing things straight on. Nothing in nature is that way.”

Also in the display is a full-body mount of a standing whitetail buck. “That’s not a trophy rack, but it has great significance to my family,” he said.

“Like all taxidermists, I save animal body parts for special situations. In this case, I used the antlers from a buck my grandpa had shot a long time ago. When my wife shot a small buck, I thought, this is the time.”

He used the skin from her buck and the antlers from his grandfather’s and made a full-body mount of a deer walking down a creek with a waterfall feature.

“It honors the deer and the hunts of my wife and grandfather.”

The rocks and trees in the display are all hand done, detailed with sagebrush roots shellacked for effect.

“The display base can be as simple or detailed as you want,” he said.

With full-size bear mounts and massive big game with horns and antlers around his shop, Keeling said he was equally excited to mount an ermine a man had just brought in.

The weasel in its winter-white phase will be a new challenge. “Ermine ears are smaller than a dime and the skin is paper thin,” he said. “They’re an animal with personality.”

Taxidermy is a hard gig that goes through the economic ups and downs any small business endures. Weather or other factors that result in a bad hunting season shows dramatically in his bottom line, Keeling said.

“Some years are definitely better for big bucks than others,” he said.

With one deer mount mostly finished, Keeling was in his shop grooming the fur like a hair stylist, brushing it and using an air compressor to blow out dirt, loose hair and sawdust.

“You clean up the eyes; give attention to details like where the eyelid meets the eye; airbrush, get the insides of the nostrils, fix the tear ducts and the insides of the ears and clean any paint off the hair,” he said of the final touches.

“A taxidermist doesn’t last long if he doesn’t love what he’s doing,” Keeling said. “It’s a labor of love.”

Despite all of his practice making dead animals lifelike, he says he couldn’t translate his skills and interests into the mortuary business.

“I can’t do pets either,” he said, noting that he’s been asked more than once. “I don’t do pets,” he emphasized.