.... (... this is a follow up to a previous post. To view the entire soggy beaver saga, begin here)
Well, at long last, part of this beaver tail has come to an
end, though, I also realize, that so it goes, with endings, it is also probably
just the beginning!...
A few days ago, I got a call, said “I got yer beaver", so
after work, I went up to retrieve ‘er.
You see, I had commissioned the services, of one Aaron
Honeycutt, a skilled taxidermist, who runs
his business, Fox-Fire Taxidermy,
just up the road from where I had
found the Beaver, our Lady Of The Lake, about this time last year.
It is somewhat comforting for me to see this creature reach
full circle, right in her own neighborhood. I could have worked with another
Taxidermist in Durham, (and while I’m sure he would have done a good job also,
something felt right about going with Aaron.
It was Aaron in fact who had advised me over the telephone,
when I first pulled up in my bandmate, Bruce Saunders front lawn, holding a
hulking rodent. (Bruce designed and maintaines Mr. Honeycutt's website.
When I went to Mr. Honeycutt's house, to pick up the pelt, I found that all was silent...
I paused for quite a long while, and took in the scene. What a neat place, a neat guy.
After a little while, I went over to his colorful green
house, and gave a rap on his deep red door.
Out popped Aaron, who seemed to be in a good mood.
There had been some concern, during the drop off, if the skin would turn out all right.
Factors such as: How long had the Beaver been laying in the
hot road before I found her, and how long after I found her had we frozen her.
The thawing for skinning, and refreezing.
All of these
factors, some unknowns, could come to bare on the success of the tanning.
If I was wrong about my hunch that she had JUST met her
maker, when I came upon her, the tanning could fail, and my father and I would
be out $175.
There was also the question of would the tail and the hind
feet survive the process.
Normally says Aaron, these parts are removed for the tanning
process, which mainly focuses on coming out with a nice soft pelt. So it was
quite unorthodox to leave these features on a tanned skin, and in fact he had
never done it (though of course he had worked with many a tail and paw in his
other, normal taxidermy work.
But of course, these were, to me, the features that were
most worth preserving, to share with the tactile senses of a young person who
has never experienced, say an odd reptilian paddle paired with the soft fur of
a dog. Or the large paws of a dog, mixed improbably with the webbed feet of a
duck! All one hulking rotund rodent!
So I was glad to see that Aaron was in such a good mood, this seemed to bear well on the matters at hand!...
Well fortunately for me, my father, and said young person,
under the skilled hands of Master
Taxidermist, Aaron Honeycutt, these features survived, and in flying
colors!!!
It was all there. The big back paws, the little front ones,
her rubbery little snout, with its whiskers, the cute little black cups of
ears, and of course that tail, which was beautifully preserved.
While we were talking, Aaron decided to illuminate something of the Beaver’s anatomy, that had been puzzling me since my friend Perrin and I first inspected it that day.
And that was a very oddly shaped fingernail on its hind
foot. In fact, so strange was it, that it was almost like TWO finger nails, or
tiny cloven hoof even! at the a single digit…!
Very odd this neighbor creature, this native of our streams.
And I don’t think you’d guess what it was, not in your
wildest dreams.
I have to admit that I sure hadn’t, thought once he told me,
it was looking me right in the face… According to Mr. Honeycutt, this
bifurcated claw, was cloven for the purpose of pulling burrs from the fur of
this woodland animal! In essence, this create was equipped with its own comb!
Now that is some innovative design!
Aaron also gave me strict instruction on the care for the
pelt. As he explained, when he agreed to take on the project (he is quite
backed up with work!), he was willing to take it to a certain point, but it was
for me to finish the job, undertaking the laborious last stage of softening the
pelt by kneading and ringing it by hand. The entire under surface of the skin
had to be meticulously and thouroughly wrought within the next 48 hours, as it
began to dry. Were it not properly wrung with in this window, it would dry into
a stiff mat, rather than the soft pelt that it could become. So, thinking of
the many hands that will handle it over the years, I have taken it with me every
where I go for the past few days. Which has made for some interesting
conversations!
My first step was over to Stacye Leanza’s house, to show her
our trophy. Stacye, of course had been instrumental in supporting this whole
process, helping to skin the Beaver, butcher, process and cook the meet, and
brokering between Mr. Honeycutt and I.
So I stopped by for a visit with Stacye and Soren that
evening, and we sat around and chewed the fat, and kneaded the beaver.
Ahhh…good times J
