Knowing how many discussions take place on where and how to get taxidermy done would like to share my experience with getting trophies mounted in South Africa.
Hunting in 2009 had the chance to have a look through the workshop of Taxidermy Africa located at Humansdorp in the Cape District of South Africa. Had the trophies of a 10 day plains game Safari processed ready for shipping back to Australia, including numerous backskins etc. On the same trip had the trophies of a 14 day Buffalo Safari in Zimbabwe processed at a different location so had a chance for some direct comparions.
Not only was the quality of the tanning work of Taxidermy Africa superior, comment by the Taxidermist back here in Oz, the shipment bloody near beat me home!!! A liitle less time friendly was the much prized Buffalo and plains game trophies by both the tanner in Africa and the Taxidermist back here in Australia.
So fast forward to September 2011 and a hunt with CM Safaris for Elephant/Buffalo/Sable I made the decision to get my Taxidermy done in Africa and shipped back to Australia, and it is one of the better decisions I have ever made!!!!
From the time of notifying Taxidermy Afica that I was interested in getting a Quote on the species that I was Hunting, through the recieval of the shipment of mounted trophies I was kept totally up to date by the lovely Natalie.
It was one of those trips that all the stars line up at once, and the goddess of hunting smiled upon my humble efforts. Not only did we manage to take a tuskless elephant, buffalo of a life time, a Sable that I had only dreamed about, but also a rogue Elephant Bull that had killed a lady froma local fishing village on the Zambezi. With the ban on importing any Ivory into Australia, my only real option was replica tusks and after many hours of searching the world wide web who do you think does life like replica tusks? Why Taxidermy Africa of course!!!!!!
With the many fine details of the exact styles of mounts that I required, also adding the dozens of helpful suggestions by Natalie, the trophies were recieved by Taxidermy Africa from Zimbabwe in late January 2012. Once in their care I recieved regular up-dates, at least every fortnight if not every week, of my trophies progress.
A mere five months later they ready for shipping, very much Christmas in July in this household when the crate finally arrives. Following is a series of photo's taken during the un-wrapping process......

crate in the shed

solidly built, not only screwed but bolted as well

first look, where do I start

screwed, wrapped, taped ain't nothing moving here

like jig saw puzzle

that well fastend that have to resort to cutting the ply wood with a jig-saw to access the 23 srews holing the mounts down


all together the crate held,
# full body Hyena
# wall pedestal buffalo
# pedestal Sable + pedestal
# replica Ele Tusks
# bases for tusks
# shoulder mount bushbuck
# shoulder mount reedbuck
# bronzed hyena skull in it's own special box.

A total of 2 1/2 hours was needed to sucessfully unbolt , unscrew, unwrap the crate. Not one piece had shifted in the entire journey of several thousand km's and two custom inspections.
The Quality of the Taxidermy work itself is outstanding, only outshone by the communication throughout the entire process. As you can probably tell I AM IMPRESSED!!!!!!!!!

All very nice trophies the hyena looks great and one you do not see too often.

Nice to see a good report on my local taxidermist.
Thanks for sharing.

Thank you for sharing this and congratulations on some excellent animals.

sjb:
Great and I'm happy for you.

My last box contained a buffalo, kudu, waterbuck, skulls only, in a wood slatted box with not one piece of packing material and the skulls were not fastened in the box. They rattled around on the journey here. The taxidermist was Matabeleland Taxidermy of Bulawayo and, of course, thy said all was packed correctly but someone opened the box and took out the packing material and unfastened the skulls. I will leave my trophies in the bush before using those lying bastards another time.

Again, pleased all turned out well for you.
Cal

Go the Peacocks.

quote:

Originally posted by cal pappas:
sjb:
Great and I'm happy for you.

My last box contained a buffalo, kudu, waterbuck, skulls only, in a wood slatted box with not one piece of packing material and the skulls were not fastened in the box. They rattled around on the journey here. The taxidermist was Matabeleland Taxidermy of Bulawayo and, of course, thy said all was packed correctly but someone opened the box and took out the packing material and unfastened the skulls. I will leave my trophies in the bush before using those lying bastards another time.

Again, pleased all turned out well for you.
Cal

i used Matebeleland Taxi for work done on a hunt 9-10 years ago. everyhting was well done and well packed. guess times have changed. sorry to hear of your bad experience. as an aside, i am going on a management bull ele hunt in the Caprivi in a 2 months and am considering a set of replica tusks.i realize the ivory will small but WTH, it will probably be the only tusked ele will ever hunt and any tusks are better than no tusks. now to find someone here to do the work.

The owner of Matabeleland Taxidermy passed away a couple of years ago.Mr. Don Reeve.He moved out of Zim and set up a new shop in Port Alfred,just before he passed.
I dont know who has taken over his shop in Zim

Good to see such a deservedly glowing report on Taxidermy Africa. As stated [ and clearly shown ] they are a first class operation.

Taxidermy Africa
P.O. Box 976
Humansdorp 6300
South Africa

Tel: +27 42 291 0656
Fax: +27 42 291 0384
Website: www.taxidermyafrica.com