Unto the Least of These: Of Wild Animals

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Of Wild Animals

As I mentioned in a previous post, Danny got a turkey 2 weekends ago. Since Dan doesn't have any experience in dealing with turkeys, he didn't want to butcher it till he knew what was required by a taxidermist if we wanted to get it mounted or at least get the beard and tail mounted. So they neatly wrapped it up and stuck it in my freezer! :O

In our research we discovered a full turkey mount was around $500-600. So that wasn't an option. Mounting just the tail, beard and spurs was around $90.

In the mean time, Danny told us he would like to mount the tail, beard and spurs himself. He could get a kit at Walmart for $20 and he had been watching YouTube videos enough that he was confident he could do it. We decided to let him try it.....after all, this is HIS first turkey and it would be more special, even if it doesn't turn out taxidermist quality!

So Sunday night we got the turkey out of the freezer and Monday afternoon he tackled the job ahead of him with great eagerness. I sat on the porch and watched him, because what fun is it to work alone? :) And of course I needed to get some pics! :)

The first thing he did was cut the beard off.....and discovered it has two beards!! :) He's heard of that before and so he was excited to discover that was the case with this one!

Next he cut out the breast meat. I got the job of cleaning and freezing it! :)

Here's the tail, beard and spurs sitting with salt drying them out. Not sure how long they have to be like that till he can mount them, but they are sitting in his bed room! :P

He did a fine job so far....I think I can say he is a true hunter!! I'm impressed with how well he did in taking care of this task! I enjoy watching him do something he enjoys! :)

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Sunday night we were visiting with our friends Dave & Shannon Z. and on the way home, just down from their house, a deer came bounding out of the woods right into the side of "Sally" :( We stopped to see what kind of damage there was and Dan could see the deer on the road behind us, so we turned around and went back. She was sitting in the middle of the road and had blood coming out of her mouth. So we went back to Dave & Shannon's and the guys went out to put her out of her misery, but she wasn't there any more!

I think one poor deer had a serious head ache that night....who knows if she even lived? :(

But this is what the van looks like. Monday I went to a local body shop and the man so kindly took out the dent in front of the drivers door, so we could actually open the door right!