Well, I'm sure that you can all tell what I'm going to ask here.

I'm hunting in Zimbabwe with Chifuti next summer. I'm curious what other Canadians have done with regard to their taxidermy from Africa. I had the work from my first hunt done in RSA and it turned out pretty nicely. I've always thought that the guys in a certain country can taxidermy their animals better than someone from a foreign country (would I ship a moose to RSA to have it done?) but that was based on pretty limited experience. Is there any opinion on who to use? Tamela at Safari Classics recommended The Wildlife Gallery and that might be a pretty safe bet, given what I've read on the board, but them we have to deal with shipping to Canada and I don't know what kind of headache that presents. Above all I want the mounts to look good. I have to look at them for a long time yet (should have taken up safari hunting when I was in my 50's, not my 20's!) so I want to be happy with them.

My primary quarry will be Cape Buffalo and hopefully I can manage a few other PG animals in there. Any advice from people that have "been there and done that" would be greatly appreciated.

We hunted with Chifuti just last month, and we will have quite a bit of stuff to come home. Just some info from our discussions with several of the PH's and other locals. They all said to have my elephant leather tanned there, and flat skins also. They all said to have capes and life-size skins dipped only, and tanned and mounted here at home in the US. That was our original plan anyway, but they reinforced our decision. The photos I've seen of Wildlife Gallery's work shows attention to detail and great artistry.

Good luck on your hunt; it will be successful for buff and you will see PG also. They run a great operation.

I mount quite a few trophies every year from Africa,esp Zimbabwe.and more than 2/3 send their trophies home to the USA and the rest stay in Africa. Which is fine, its your trophies do what you want. I just like to tell people to support their economy--where ever that may be....Just check their refences..

www.african-montana-taxidermy.com