I'm still waiting for my taxidermist to receive my trophies. Everyone else's stuff in my party, except mine and one other guys, made it over a month ago. Guess our stuff caught the slow boat.

Meanwhile I've been reviewing the reference photos I took of my animals and some for my friends animals. I'm also eyeballing and comparing these photos to quite a few mounts for some ideas when the stuff finally gets here.

Comparing live photos of animals to mounts really makes some mistakes or omissions jump out at you.

I'm sure some of us could fill page after page on just horn angle mistakes, wrong eyes, and wrong ear position.

Barring some of those blatant Boo-Boos. These are some of the ones I have noticed that really set my teeth on edge. When someone expounds on how "great a deal" they got, look for some of this stuff.

Pet Peeve #1: Painting the inside of a Kudu's ears black. To me that is totally unnatural. No joke I've seen it. What the heck is that?

Pet Peeve #2: Waterbuck nose has no center cleft. A waterbuck's nose in my opinion is one of the most unique and distinguishing facial features the animal has. Blowing it out flat and featureless, so it looks like bobo the clowns nose painted black is disgraceful.

Pet Peeve #3: Steenbuck nose has no upturned ridge, this ridge actually forms a slight chevron at the top pointing back to a point directly between the eyes. Also often absent are the straight parallel wrinkles in the dark skin behind the nose.

Pet Peeve #4: Warthog looks like it had a face lift. I understand warthogs are tough to do. I've seen far to many warthog mounts that are stretched so balloon tight over a form they look to me like they are going to explode! My hats off to any taxidermist that can pull off the natural wrinkled look of a warthog. That can't be easy.

I'm sure you folks have more to add.

You have mentioned some good things to look for. It all comes down to anatomy and knowing your subject, not just knowledge of the techniques and process.

Ear butt/muscle anatomy is one of the most frequently messed up things that I see. If you think about it, many of the components of a modern mount are pre-fabricated and usually close to anatomically correct. However, The ear butts are usually formed/shaped out of clay. This is where unskilled labor and not using good reference material will get you in trouble. Ears can move but the point where the ear canal enters the skull does not move. This pivot point has to be in the right place or the animal will look "funny."

The standard for what is good taxidermy is often set at a satisfied client. Trying to create a picture that is as close to a living animal as you can get is the real goal IMO.

It always pleases me to see hunters noticing the details that most people do not see.

Sounds to me like someone picked the wrong taxidermist. - check www.lifeform.co.za for how it should be done...

I agree that the ears are the most often part of an African mount that are messed up. For some reason, many of the one that are mounted in Africa stick straight up like a jack rabbit!