One of my mounts is RUINED!!!!

[paktermite]

I am hoping to get some practical advice from everyone who has had this problem. I have a mount that I picked up in June of 05 from my taxidermist. He has done a number of mounts for me in the past without any problems. I was cleaning one room of my mounts last night and one of them had hair falling out of it while I cleaned it! Now, please note that I am EXTREMELY anal when it comes to clean... borderline obsessive in my home. I have had numerous taxidermy mounts in my homes for years, and never had a problem. Well this particular mount was infested behind one of it's ears with moths. I immediately pulled that mount off the wall and put it in the garage. I checked the other 5 mounts that were also in that room at the time and they seem to be fine. BUT the mount in question is ruined, there is a HUGE piece of hair missing. My NEW taxidermist looked at it today and he said it will have to be redone. It's toast. He also told me that I better treat my other mounts immediately with some sort of fumigation. So they are all in big lawn bags right now being treated for this... hopefully this will kill any larva present in the other mounts... but as I said, there wasn't any sign of problems in the other mounts.

My question is this, have any of you had a problem like this before? If so, what did you do? And according to my taxidermist, he said that if it was one of his customers and the mount was barely a year old, he would re-mount free of charge. Problem is, this deer had a neck over 25", so a cape will be tough to find. I don't want to be a jerk to my old taxidermist, he is a super nice guy... but my current taxidermist knows of him and has heard of problems like this from his shop... I don't know what to do... but I feel like I just lost one of my pets or something...

Sorry for the long post.

 

[katy]

Are you saying that he did not get it cleaned out good enough when he mounted it, or is the infestation on the outside of the ear? I am lost without pics or more info.

 

[TimberPig]

I had a mount done about 18 years ago that had some type of bugs in it, among other problems. I didnt notice them until they were dead, they looked kind of like weavels. I didnt do anything with it as far as I can remember, but it didnt spread to my other mounts.
It was a very cheap taxidermy job and I got about what I paid for, crap.

 

[NWBuck]

It wasn't a bug infestation, but we had a problem similar with a local taxidermist a few years ago. Basically, he did the worst job on this mount I've ever seen. It was a deer my dad shot many years ago that we were having remounted with a cape from a buck I'd shot that fall. We were sick when it finally came back...just extremely poor attention to detail. I hate to tell you, but this particular guy didn't offer to do anything to remedy the situation and we ended up loosing the unique cape and paying to have the job redone correctly. It ultimately all comes down to the integrity of the guy I suppose. It sounds like you've already taken the most practical step you can...find a different taxidermist. Good luck.

NWBuck

 

[JNRBRONC]

[ QUOTE ]
I got about what I paid for, crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

I fell into this exact situation, going cheap on two mounts with a "journey man" taxidermist. Moths started flying out of the ears and my wife said, "They gotta go!". Couldn't blame her, so I cut the racks out of the mounts. I don't think a mounted deer will be welcome in the house ever again.

 

[dblmainbeam]

I have never had bugs but on the subject of you get what you pay for.
I use a taxidermist my dad always uses and he is really exspensive and everthing he has done for my dad and I has turned out awesome. He pays alot of attention to the small detail like the eyes and lips.
My last deer looks like crap compared to the others because I got talked into using a local taxidermist because he is "awesome" and 150.00 bucks cheaper. Theres a reason he cheaper. Its eyes look like there popping out of its head and the lips are a black line. Never Again.

 

[Benny]

I would suspect the cape was not tanned properly.

I would call your taxidermitst and make him aware of the problem and see if he will fix the problem. A good person would do this, if he tells you to bad to sad, I would never take anything back to him and tell your buddies to go elsewhere.