Home Taxidermy for Pleasure and Profit | Page 8

directly in the hot wax as it will not mix evenly so.
Wax should be melted in a water bath, like a glue pot, as excessive heat will darken it. Cakes of wax of suitable colors may be had of the supply dealers and are most economical when no great amount of work is done. The same parties supply the paper pulp previously mentioned.
CHAPTER IV.
PANELS, SHIELDS AND NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL MOUNTS.
The preparation of a suitable setting for almost any mounted specimen will add greatly to its attractiveness. If you know where it is to be placed it is not difficult to make it suit its surrounding. For instance, a head of big game for hanging in a dining or ball room is suitably mounted on a polished and carved hardwood shield. While this would hardly match its surroundings on the wall of a log camp, a rustic panel of natural wood with the bark on would perfectly suit the latter place.
Heads, horns, and antlers are usually mounted on what are called shields. Fish and trophies of dead game birds and small game on panels. Single specimens are placed on severely plain wooden bases (museum style) or on those simulating branches, rocks, stumps or earth. These are artificial, but those built up in part at least with natural objects are most pleasing.
As we can not produce the best patterns of shields without special machines we must patronize either the supply dealers or the wood working mill for such. If convenient to a mill equipped with jigsaw and moulder they can be made up after your own patterns.
[Illustration: SHIELDS--VARIOUS KINDS AND SIZES.
(A) Suitable for moose, caribou, deer, fox by making or ordering according to size wanted; (B) Moose, caribou, deer; (K) Round shield; (E) Bear shield; (Q) Combination--head and feet.]
[Illustration: SHIELDS, FOOT AND HALL RACK.
(C) and (D) Deer Shields (J) Four Feet Rack (V) Hall Rack]
[Illustration: GUN RACK, FISH AND GAME PANELS, HALL RACK.
(I) Gun rack (F) Fish panel (H) Shield, combination head and feet (S) Hall Rack, small.]
[Illustration: SOME SHIELDS AND PANELS.
(M) Shield with carving (G) Panel for game, x, y, z, aa, bb Deer foot thermometers (L) Deer foot thermometer and small animal panel.]
Some of the sizes most used are approximately as follows for mounted heads:
For moose, elk, caribou. 20×30 inches.
For deer, goat or sheep. 12×18 or 16×21.
For fox or lynx. 8×10 inches.
For bear or wolf. 12×15
For birds, small fur-bearers and fish. 6×8 in.
Oval panels for mounting fish. 9×22 15×40
For dead game. 10×15 14×24 17×25
For mounting horns of elk and moose the size for deer heads will answer nicely, while deer antlers are suitable with a shield of the fox head size.
In order to draw a symmetrical pattern for the woodworker, take a piece of stiff paper of the right length and width, fold it down the middle, draw one half to suit and cut out with shears. The style of moulding called Ogee is to be preferred. A simple diamond, heart, or oval shape can be made at home with beveled or rounded edges, or if your tools include a turning saw (which is most useful for a variety of purposes) you may try a more pretentious shield. To achieve this, make your pattern as just described and after marking it on a piece of wood from 3/8 to 7/8 inch thick, cut out with the turning saw. It should be held in the vise for this operation. Place this cut out shield (1) on a piece of board of similar thickness but somewhat larger and with a pair of compasses mark out another 1/2 in. or so larger all around. (2) Also mark the same distance inside the edge.
[Illustration: HOME MADE SHIELD.]
With a wood worker's gauge or something similar make a mark around them both near the lower sides. Now with draw shave and rasp work the edges off both Nos. 1 and 2. No. 1 on a bevel, No. 2 rounded. There should be a number of holes drilled and countersunk in No. 2, from the back, and when the two parts of the shield are properly adjusted they should be drawn closely together with screws too short to penetrate the face of the shield.
If the adjustment is perfect the screws are to be drawn and the surfaces which come in contact coated well with glue, then drawn closely together and laid aside until thoroughly dry, when it should be well sandpapered before varnishing.
All shields and panels should be carefully sandpapered, filled and varnished, and polished if you wish. Don't make the shield or panel so ornate that the specimen will seem but an incidental, thrown in for good measure, so to speak.
Rustic panels can be made by sawing the end from a log on a slant, and planing smooth the oval. If this is heavily varnished on