Levi Hendrix Studio's Field Care

Birds Ducks Turkeys

Learning how to properly take care of your birds after the hunt is easy if you follow a few basic rules.
#1. After collecting the bird, the body heat needs to cool off, so place your bird in cool, shady place for an hour.
#2. After the bird has cooled down, bend the head and neck over the body and place in 3 sealed plastic bags.
#3. Place bird in a safe part of your freezer where no one can disturb it, or lay something on top of your bird that may cause damage.
Here are a few common mistakes hunters make that can greatly affect the quality of there bird mounts.
Never place your bird in a pantyhose. This will freezer burn the bird quickly if no plastic bags are used. What needs to be protected in the birds moisture.
Never place a warm bird behind your back in any field game jacket or bag. This will only promote the bird to spoil.
Never hold a bird by it's neck. Always carry the bird by it's feet. Holding the bird by it's neck can cause feather loss.

Big Game

Caping a game head

Skinning is the process of removing the hide from a game animal.

Using a sharp knife make initial cut 4” behind front legs and cut around the entire animal.
Second cut starts at initial cut at the top of the back. Second cut runs along the back of the neck and stops 2” back behind the antlers. Split the second cut to form a “Y” running to the rear base of each antler.
Cut hide around each front leg at the knee. Start next cut at the back of the knee and cut hide up the back of front leg to the top of the front leg. Then angle cut back to meet the initial cut. Repeat this cut for the other front leg.

On antlered game, a heavy screwdriver with a 1/4” blade is useful in prying hide loose from around the antler bases. On horned game carefully use a knife to cut between the hair and horn junction. Take the time to pull the hair down and away from the horn base to avoid cutting hair with the knife.

Begin to separate the hide along the neck incision taking extra care at the ears, eyes and lips. Cut the ear canal close to the skull. It is always attached farther back and lower than you think. If you place your finger in the ear canal it will help determine this point. Take care not to cut the tip of you finger. Again using your finger as a guide skin around the eyes cutting close to the skull. Be aware of the tear duct at the front of the eyes. You'll have to carefully cut or pry tear duct out of the depression in the skull. The lips should be cut close to the skull taking extra time leaving all lip and gum material attached to the hide.

Make sure the cape is long enough for a shoulder mount. The cape should include the area behind the front legs. Being sure to include the full brisket and complete armpits. The antlers can be removed by a saw cut from the rear of the skull towards the center of the eye socket. And a second cut starting above the eye socket connecting with the first cut.

Congratulations you've successfully caped your big game animal. At this point you should take the cape to your taxidermist. Depending on weather and cape storage conditions, determine the amount of time you have. If you can freeze or place cape in cold storage this is preferable. Treat cape as well or better than your meat. Keep it dry, cool and bug free. Take care not to have the hide dry out. Two main factors, heat and moisture cause bacterial growth, the cause of hair slip. Eliminate or reduce these factors and you increase the quality of your trophy.

Small Game

When decideing to do a life-size mount, take into consideration the size of the animal and where you will be placing it. A life-size moose is huge and may not fit into the room you would like to put it in. I am going to skip to small life size animals because the skinning techniques vary with most animals and this could ramble on for a long time. Call your taxidermist if you want detailed instructions on how to skin big game for full body work. Small game from coyotes to squirrels make outstanding life-size mounts that will fit into most trophy rooms with little problem. They will look best with a simple or complex habitat base that you help design. With a little extra work, life-size mounts add greatly to any trophy collection. Most small game is best skinned using a dorsal incision. This cut will begin at the base of the tail and extend to the back of the head, along the back of the animal. Skinning the face and feet of small animals is time consuming and difficult without proper tools, so it may be best to leave that job to the taxidermist. With the dorsal incision, you should be able to get the body of the animal out without any problem. Salt or freeze the skin as soon as possible and get it to your taxidermist. If the animal is small enough, or you have the room, you may want to freeze the whole animal and bring it to your taxidermist whole. Many taxidermist prefer this so they can make a decision on how best to skin the animal based on hair length, mount position, etc.

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