I am curious what any of you are doing with your eland for taxidermy? I have seen a pedestal or two, lots of euro mounts but little else. I know we have some talented taxidermists that post here (even award winning) so I'm curious what types of eland mounts you are doing. I don't have an eland in the bag yet but I'm working on it and thinking ahead.

Y.D:

It is a very good idea to plan ahead. Mounts such as pedestal types requre additional cape and having one caped and skinned without consideration of the mount often leads to consderable additional expense and or disappointment.

Eland being rather massive,long necked and tall from chest to horn tip can overwhelm many homes and smaller trophy rooms.

As massive as they are I have never seen a live one that looks like some of the bloated renditions I have seen. I believe that the overly wide shoulder and barrel shaped neck occurs from folks attempting to "use" the extra skin that these animals have naturally hanging loose under their neck and shoulder.

Pedestal mounts tend to allow for them to be placed in lower ceiling rooms without appearing to be hung too low. The more upright pedestal pose also does not protrude as far into the room as a typical wall mount.

If you have room for a lifesize they are impressive animals but the common eland is typically a large amount of gray mass and unless the pose has some emphasis on the animals fantastic agility it can be a bit big and boring.

Here are a few recent eland mounts we have put together.



The above is the new SCI world record muzzleloader.








By putting a bit of offset in the shoulder and some turn in the neck even large animal shoulder mounts can have some character.



If you have the ceiling height a taller pedestal can certainly elevate the status of the animal!

Best Regards and good hunting!

Mike O

I like the first pose. Thanks.