I have inquired about the honesty of Ron Kelly. The only response I have ever had was on this forum when I asked who should do my reproduction. Well after several suggestions for Ron, I contacted him and exchanged several emails. I asked him several times for a final price estimate, and all I ever got was a per inch price and pressure for him to do the mount. Well, I told him to hold off on the mount so that I could check my finances, I get an email about a week ago saying that he started my mount on good faith and to send a deposit asap. A good amount of searching on google has yielded me some not so favorable words for Mr. Kelly and his work. Granted this was all back in mid to late 2007, I still am very concerned about sending someone I do not know money. I ask once again, does anyone know Mr. Kelly, and have any explanation to his recent bad reviews? I plan on calling him tomorrow, but I don't want to call him out for no reason... Please Help

I believe Ron Kelly was married to Bev from from Bev's Fish Creations and the business was split a few years ago. Divorce can do bad things to ones life.

I do not remember the name of the first shop but Yes, the wife got it in the divorce then changed the name to Bev's.

If it wasn't clear what sort of mount was to be done, how would a per-inch price be sufficient? Did he give you prices for various sorts of habitat or even base the per inch price on whether or not the fish was to be finished on both sides?

When people selling something get pushy, I get really nervous. HOWEVER, I notice on his web site that he takes visa/mc. If you pay him with this method you are protected to a substantial degree by the card issuer. If you are happy with his work and the per inch price, I would probably go forward with the reproduction. If he stops work for whatever reason or you are not happy with the work, there is always the option of workng with the CC company to get yout money back. Yours is not like most taxidermy situations where one's capes can be held hostage.

JMHO

It is for a largemouth. He did give me a per inch price and other options but I have inquired several times about the total price for the job and I have never gotten one.