F.A.Q.

Freeze Drying VS Conventional Taxidermy

   Thunder Bay Taxidermy owns and operates 4 large capacity freeze driers. We have been doing conventional taxidermy full time since 1990 and wholesale freeze drying since 1996. We also do retail taxidermy.

    We have found over the years that conventional taxidermy is the only way to go for some mounts. Freeze dry does a better job for others and a combination of the two can often produce the highest quality mount.

    For fish, we mount conventionally using fish tanning agents and degreasers. Then finish the mounted fish in the freeze drier thereby eliminating shrinkage in the tongue, throat latch and gills. Your customer will be very pleased when you show him the difference between a shrunken borax tanned fish tongue and a well done freeze dried tongue. On the fatty cold water species, like trout and salmon,  we mount as above but use an artificial head on all species except brook trout. The quality and longevity of the mount is excellent. I still have properly mounted freeze dry fish that were done in 1996. I know of other taxidermists that have cold water fish mounts 25 years old, showing no effects of oil or leakage. We have also had excellent results in skin mounting catfish using this combination of conventional and freeze dry taxidermy.

    On small game such as squirrels and pets, we freeze dry the entire animal. This gives excellent detail to the mouth area and the toes, nose, etc. show no shrinkage. All of our freeze dried animals are injected throughout with liquid bug proofer and are dusted with Sevin before we ship to you.

    Larger game animals such as beavers and fox, we mount conventionally.

   Overall we offer a wholesale mounting service that will give you the best of both worlds, and quality that will keep your customers coming back.