A 5 year story finally comes to a close. While attending college, I picked up a large mule deer rack and I have been wondering how great it would look like mounted ever since. Since then, I've periodically been checking ebay for a cape and most of the good ones sell for between 150 and 250. I finally saw a nice one that looked like it was going to sell fairly low. So I got permission from my wife to bid on it. She was so kind to say yes and I actually won. I got it for 91 dollars plus 35 for shipping. I called Bruce Sandahl in Lancaster to see if he would be willing to do a mule deer mount for me. At first he said that he'd rather not, but that if I couldn't find anybody else, to give him a call back. I called a couple other places - Lake of the Woods taxidermy quoted me $550 to do a muley - and eventually called Bruce back. I said I had the cape coming the next day and he said, "well can you bring it over tomorrow afternoon?" So that's just what I did. The cape shipped from Texas and it made it up here just fine. Good thing it was still pretty cold up here then. Dad and I drove over there and walked into his museum of a garage and into his first garage(these were both additions over the years due to his taxidermy). We had some good conversation and exchanged information and he said it would be about a month. I told him I was in no hurry. The rediculous part is that in 16 days, he called me to say that it was finished. That was Sunday morning the 20th. I told him I couldn't make it that day but that I'd head over Monday morning. Dad came with again and as soon as we entered the same garage, I said, "and there it is" it was tipped on its back with its nose in the air and the width was something to behold. It was jaw dropping from even a poor angle. Bruce came into the room a couple minutes later and he started talking about the score of the thing. I think it blew him away. He said he came up with over 200" gross typical. Dad and I were gawking at the unbelievable job he did on the mount. He charged $4oo plus tax - so $427.50. I gave him a tip because of how fast he got it done. It looks astounding. Dad was so fired up. It was exciting to have him help hang it up at our place.
It truly is a jaw dropping, possibly once in a lifetime typical mule deer. There's something about putting it back on a head that just makes a person stare. One unfortunate thing is that it makes my mid-140" gross and 120" gross whitetails look puny. Was it worth the five year wait and $575? No doubt.
I'll post a few more close ups of the great job Bruce did with the taxidermy.
A 5 year story finally comes to a close. While attending college, I picked up a large mule deer rack and I have been wondering how great it would look like mounted ever since. Since then, I've periodically been checking ebay for a cape and most of the good ones sell for between 150 and 250. I finally saw a nice one that looked like it was going to sell fairly low. So I got permission from my wife to bid on it. She was so kind to say yes and I actually won. I got it for 91 dollars plus 35 for shipping. I called Bruce Sandahl in Lancaster to see if he would be willing to do a mule deer mount for me. At first he said that he'd rather not, but that if I couldn't find anybody else, to give him a call back. I called a couple other places - Lake of the Woods taxidermy quoted me $550 to do a muley - and eventually called Bruce back. I said I had the cape coming the next day and he said, "well can you bring it over tomorrow afternoon?" So that's just what I did. The cape shipped from Texas and it made it up here just fine. Good thing it was still pretty cold up here then. Dad and I drove over there and walked into his museum of a garage and into his first garage(these were both additions over the years due to his taxidermy). We had some good conversation and exchanged information and he said it would be about a month. I told him I was in no hurry. The rediculous part is that in 16 days, he called me to say that it was finished. That was Sunday morning the 20th. I told him I couldn't make it that day but that I'd head over Monday morning. Dad came with again and as soon as we entered the same garage, I said, "and there it is" it was tipped on its back with its nose in the air and the width was something to behold. It was jaw dropping from even a poor angle. Bruce came into the room a couple minutes later and he started talking about the score of the thing. I think it blew him away. He said he came up with over 200" gross typical. Dad and I were gawking at the unbelievable job he did on the mount. He charged $4oo plus tax - so $427.50. I gave him a tip because of how fast he got it done. It looks astounding. Dad was so fired up. It was exciting to have him help hang it up at our place.
It truly is a jaw dropping, possibly once in a lifetime typical mule deer. There's something about putting it back on a head that just makes a person stare. One unfortunate thing is that it makes my mid-140" gross and 120" gross whitetails look puny. Was it worth the five year wait and $575? No doubt.
I'll post a few more close ups of the great job Bruce did with the taxidermy.