Today's Backyard Wildlife

I had mentioned two of my humming bird feeders were trashed by racoons. I got another one two weeks ago and there's been plenty of activity.

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Nature Man said:
@Wildthings
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djg said:
Yes, if I didn't care about the cost, I'd send him everything.
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Nature Man said:
Thought he might have some tips or insights.
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djg said:
He did tell me how he did his turkey fans and the to clean up the feathers, but I'm not good enough at it.
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I knew I felt my ears burning while out in the shop. But here lately that could just be the heat!!





Those full-size wall rugs are a lot of work. Almost as much as a life-size flying mount. When doing fan mounts, I mark my feathers and then take them completely apart, wash them, blow dry them and then arrange them back and finally Bondo/hot glue them back together. No bugs ever want mine.

Working right now on a flying turkey and one that's going to be a hanging dead mount.
 
Wildthings said:
I knew I felt my ears burning while out in the shop. But here lately that could just be the heat!!





Those full-size wall rugs are a lot of work. Almost as much as a life-size flying mount. When doing fan mounts, I mark my feathers and then take them completely apart, wash them, blow dry them and then arrange them back and finally Bondo/hot glue them back together. No bugs ever want mine.

Working right now on a flying turkey and one that's going to be a hanging dead mount.
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First off, you wash the whole feather? And the back feathers aren't the problem, it's the layers of the little feathers that mess me up.
 
djg said:
First off, you wash the whole feather? And the back feathers aren't the problem, it's the layers of the little feathers that mess me up.
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I wash every feather. The tail coverts have not been installed in either of those two mounts above. Here's a pic of the hanging dead mount with all but the head installed. It's actually upside down in this pic to let gravity help hold the feathers in place while drying. Which won't take long in this heat IMG_1929.webp IMG_1892.webp
 
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Incredible. It's not the washing that amazes me, it's keeping every feather annotated and where it belongs on the mount so you get them glued back in the proper place.
 
Wildthings said:
I wash every feather. The tail coverts have not been installed in either of those two mounts above. Here's a pic of the hanging dead mount with all but the head installed. It's actually upside down in this pic to let gravity help hold the feathers in place while drying. Which won't take long in this heatView attachment 291596View attachment 291597
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Man your work is amazing! You need to move to IL. It's almost as hot here as TX lol.
 
DLJeffs said:
Incredible. It's not the washing that amazes me, it's keeping every feather annotated and where it belongs on the mount so you get them glued back in the proper place.
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I'm not that good! The only feathers I take completely apart are the tail feathers (18) and the tail coverts (12). All other feathers stay on the skin
 
I'm working on a first for me - a Sharp-tailed Grouse. Never done one before but upland birds are all similiar like a pheasant. A peer of mine told me to pull its pants off and try it that way. So that's what I'm doing. Skinning it in two sections. The pants section is the lower skin from halfway up the belly down to below the tail, which includes both the legs. Just like pulling its pants off. Then everything else stays together. This way you can set the mannikin up with the legs and pants on it ahead of time and inject the feet and paint them. Here's what I got so far IMG_1965.webp IMG_1964.webp
 
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