I have a crate coming into Denver from South Africa, contains hides and skulls that have been dipped and packed.
I want to clear it through customs myself so I called customs who told me I need to talk to USFW. I talked to the lady at US Fish and Wildlife who tells me I MUST use a broker to claim my trophies as they are not tanned.
Is this accurate information?
I'm a do it yourself kind of guy and look at every step as if I'm learning something new so just hiring a broker has no interest to me IF I can do it myself.
What can the experts here tell me?

I was told that you can clear the raw trophies yourself but they must be picked up / delivered directly to a USDA approved tannery/taxidermist.

Clearing the trophies is just routing the paperwork, etc.

some time back i brought them in myself. they would not release them at the airport to me only to a licensed individual. so i went in with a licensed taxidermist and then they wouldn't release them to him because his name wasn't on the shipment. ended up having to have a broker go over sign the paper hand it to me and left. only took 4 or 5 minutes and as i recall it about $400

Yep...I do it every time and it is pretty easy to do, no taxidermist involved. I've done it 15 or 16 times. PM me an email or cell number and I'll walk you thru it.

Depends on your USFW port of entry. Some are easy & some are impossible without a broker. Baltimore is easy to do yourself, Chicago is impossible without a broker.

If USFW insists on you getting a broker my advice is suck it up & get a broker. Storage charges will eat your ass if this drags on for a few days.

Note: Some animals are a lot more complicated, swine & primates. If these are in your shipment then you will have to have a approved taxidermist pick them up.

quote:

Note: Some animals are a lot more complicated, swine & primates. If these are in your shipment then you will have to have a approved taxidermist pick them up.

Ken is correct about some ports being easier than others, I've done it thru DFW, Atlanta and Houston, both were easy but DFW by far was is the easiest...if you follow their rules. Won't do it again thru Atlanta.
I have imported both swine and primates myself with no problems and no taxidermist, all hunting trophies are put in a USDA "hold" status when they arrive in the US (usually only a few days)USDA checks the paperwork and sometimes opens the crates to inspect the shipment, and have each time swine or primates are involved. For primates, an additional step is CDC approval, meaning CDC must review the paperwork and approve the shipment. The times I've imported trophies with primates, the USFWS Inspector faxes the form to the CDC (Houston in my experiences), CDC almost immediately approves and clears. Easy.
I see you are located in Colorado and there is a USFWS Wildlife Inspection Office listed in Denver. If you chose to go it alone, sign up for the eDecs program on the USFWS website, it's free, easy to do and allows you to fill out and submit your trophy clearance paperwork electronically and will let you know if there is an error.

I've cleared my trophies several times in San Francisco (not recently though) with no problems whatsoever. Since I had swine in the shipments on 2 of those shipments, it took a bit longer to get USDA clearance but each time I did it with no hassle.

Clearing trophy hides and skulls by Customs And FWS is only part of the issue. The wooden crate containing the trophies has to pass inspection, too.

Apparently, there is a process the wood crates go through to insure there aren't any insects or their eggs and larvae in the material. The crates that have been treated have a stamp on them, without that stamp the crate AND its contents are sent back to the country of origin.

When my trophies arrived in Portland, Or., neither FWS nor Customs could find any stamp on the crate. All of my hides and skulls were on the verge of getting sent back to Zimbabwe. My taxidermist, Tim Brown of Natural Instincts Taxidermy, got in his car, drove to the Portland airport, got with FWS and found the nearly illegible stamp on the crate. He saved the day, truly. Did a great job on my animal mounts, too!

For wood, See here:

https://help.cbp.gov/app/answe...terial-(wpm)-imports

And Here:

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aph...kaging%2Fct_wpm_faqs

As someone said, DFW is relatively easy. Everyone is helpful and you get to avoid the costly quagmire of Coppersmith. The exception might have been my leopard with extra complications of CITES. You get your details from the shipper and go to the FWS and Customs and get their sign offs and got back and pick up your stuff. No sweat , no Coppersmith.