Lawrence Taxidermy Studio

01/12/2025

A couple of reproduction Largemouth Bass for this customer, headed down south.

Sometimes, it's hard to envision the end from the beginning. But it's worth it more often than not.

Thank goodness for glazing putty, am I right?

Open mouth is a nice blank from Dave Campbell.

Closed mouth is NOT from Dave. It needs lots of love, and you likely won't want it when you open the box. It required attention. So it's just an unknown. 🤷‍♂️

01/12/2025

36" Skinmount Snakehead. Custom cast head, hand carved body in a dramatic sweeping pose. Hand painted eye. First one ever. I'm super excited for the next one! to rebuild damage from the arrow, shrinkage, eye setting, etc.

Thankfully, with a last-minute idea from Dakotah, I was able to get it to a stopping point i could live with and gloss it.

Always learning. Always.

12/10/2024

One of my favorite things about my job is working on things from all over the world, while sitting in my little shop in the middle of nowhere, southwest Iowa. Fur, Fish, and Game. This Mouflon came all the way from the mountains of Spain, along with an Ibex, which will be mounted later.

I will groom it as it dries, adjusting as I go. The grey in the shoulder area is wool. The skin underneath is too wet to really brush on it for the next couple of days, but it works its way from the skin outward, and then eventually, you can brush it out! It'll really make a pretty mount when done. It's been washed and conditioned and blown out with the pet groomer, but the rest will be done when it firms up a bit. Hope you like it.

11/28/2024

https://www.facebook.com/share/15HawaNyzA/

Our Black Friday Sale starts now, and runs thru Monday at 6pm. We only run one sale per year, and this is it. so don't miss out. As always, every order comes with FREE SHIPPING!!!.

https://www.taxidermyuniversity.com/

11/27/2024

This cold snap has a lot of folks excited about hunting season! We're excited to take our boys out and hopefully refill our constantly depleting food freezer in the coming weeks, that's for sure.

Hopefully, everyone, including yourselves, has a successful season. Whether you're an outdoorsman, fellow taxidermist, or both.

This deer was harvested by my cousin. The deer had a ratty cape, so we replaced it with a stock cape and couldn't be happier with the results. Ignore the cut on the nose. I'm new. I'll fix it when it's dry and ready to finish. 7.25x22 Mears SUO.

11/23/2024

28.5" of badassery halfway done. Huge shoulders. Big gut. Philadelphia Collins would be proud. 13-14lb class Mustard Tiger. Can't wait to see the mold when I crack it open tomorrow. Can I get a baam, followers???

11/18/2024

From the second I unwrapped this fish, the customer and I both had a vision for the pose. This fish is so short and fat!! But flawless condition. Every detail came out great in the cast.

We wanted a fish posed like she was about to eat something or kill something off her bed, and this is what we came up with. The fins all have a lot of shape and movement molded into them that do not show the best here. Tail down, eye rotated. It looks mean.

When it came to painting and color, I wanted to paint it like a pale, washed-out colored bass that's commonly seen and caught around here. Especially in all the muddy waters in springtime fluctuating water levels. My friend painted one similar in shape and color many, many moons ago for a show we went to, and it reminded me a lot of that. So this is what I came up with. Luckily, the customer didn't care on paint schemes, and said they catch them exactly like that in a lake he fishes anyway!

Unfortunately, I didn't get any outside images, so the pics inside are not ideal for showing all the subtleties in the artwork. Hope you enjoy.

11/17/2024

This 13lb fish just looks bassy. It is presented here in a swimming pose as a reverse curve. It just looks like it's on the hunt! One of my favorite things about making my own replicas is being able to mold the actual fish in a pose and position that is most pleasing. Often, my casts don't exhibit the typically seen features with their mouth/fin positions. Not all like them, and that's just fine. I just do my thing as I can. The rest works itself out. The customer loved this one. That was enough for me.

Custom mold and cast. Flex eyes, set with Klei Epoxy. Before and after gloss pics.

11/16/2024

Josh Jones Fishing stopped by this evening. We visited with each other for a couple of hours about hunting, fishing, and family life. Really nice guy. I genuinely enjoyed our time together chatting! And if you aren't familiar with him, he straight smashes giant fish, and guides others to do the same! Here are some replicas we went over together while he was here.

Until next time, pal.

11/15/2024

Big blimp custom mold and cast. 26x18 Hen Rainbow replica. Hand painted eye.

11/12/2024

Some stills of the 36x21 Male Brown. This was a custom mold and cast. Full Spawn.

Antiqued to show details only*

11/12/2024

I truly couldn't be happier with how this fish mold and cast came out. This is the reverse curve side, but I liked it best for the look I have in mind for it. I'll attach the Pectoral fin once everything is painted and heat some shape into them as well. It's set in place for video purposes only here.

This 36x21 Male Brown Trout was in full spawn. There are no actual scales present on him now, only skin. Its wrinkled surface is marred with teeth scrapes, gravel marks, and everything else it encountered, but to me, it's beautiful and gnarly and awesome. From the top of the head to the fin edges. Details all over. The antiqued blank really shows testament to this and how cool it's going to be to paint on him when the time comes.

That hand painted eye that's set with my epoxy will really set it off once finished!!

Please enjoy.

11/06/2024

Bad about posting on here. This is a custom molded Atlantic Tripletail. It's 32x28. An extraordinary specimen. You'll find these tasty fish under or near almost any structure in the salt, I'm told. Especially floating debris. I've never caught one. This was painted based on customer pictures and opted to include the scrapes/teeth marks, etc.

11/04/2024

This 29" Skinmount left today. I was a bit sad to see her leave. It looked really cool on the wall. Maybe I'll do one of my own one day...

Carved body, custom molded fins, and head. Hand painted eye. Baitfish is a 9" Tiger Trout chaser.

10/10/2024

Come along with me as we go through the process of doing a skinmount Rockbass. 10" fish, respectively. The Pectoral fin will be reattached when I do the finish work. I removed it to dunk the head for molding.

What a mean lookin little sucka

09/16/2024

Mold bench Monday!

27x22 Barely open mouth on the mold table today. I love this job for many reasons. Being able to work on fish of this caliber is one of them! Yowza....

09/09/2024

Here are some inside and outside pics of a Walleye replica I'm sending out today. It's a custom mold and cast I have been able to use more than once. Sometimes that pays off, but not always. I have several molds I've never pulled casts from haha!

Walleye seem to take me way more time than most fish, even though there aren't as many colors being used. I just really struggle finding a fast and effective way to do them. Maybe in another 20 years.

Eyes are from Steve Silseth. Set with Klei Epoxy, as were the fins.

Hope you enjoy.

Fish is 29Lx18-19G apx