Taxidermy art alive and well in Wasilla

WASILLA — Turns out, working with dead animals is a pretty lively business.

“I love this job, it’s a lot of fun,” said Wasilla taxidermist Mark Randolph.

Surrounded by mounted sheep, coyotes and various animal hides inside a small booth at the Mat-Su Outdoorsman Show on Friday, Randolph said he’s known he wanted to create lifelike animal mounts since he was a kid growing up in the Mat-Su. Randolph recalled the moment he knew he’d found his calling, as a 13-year-old who’d just shot his first Dall sheep in the Talkeena Mountains.

“My dad had a shoulder mount made and he came home and told me how much he paid for it and I was like, ‘I’m going to do this for the rest of my life,’” he said.

Randolph worked with local taxidermists while he was in high school at Palmer High, and later took classes in the discipline at Montgomery Community College in North Carolina. He then started his own business in Washington State, but found the animals of the Evergreen State to be a bit monotonous.

“I was doing probably 100 deer head a year,” he said.

A return to Alaska, he said, was the obvious choice.

“This is my home,” he said.

And the variety of animals in Alaska is far superior to anything he could find Outside, he said.

“You’ve got sheep, bears, fish, you’ve got all types of stuff going on,” he said. “Down there it was either constantly deer or bear and you might get something random like a raccoon. I like a challenge once in a while.”

Randolph and his fiancée, Tasha Buxton, run Randolph Taxidermy out of their home in Wasilla. In the Mat-Su, the type of animal Randolph mounts varies according to the time of year.

“If it’s bear season, people want rugs,” Buxton said.

Once moose season rolls around, however, the focus changes to mounting antlers or “European” mounts that include antlers (or horns, the case of sheep) and the animal’s skull.

Randolph said his favorite type of mounts are the lifelike full-body ones he’s occasionally asked to create.

“This one’s my favorite,” he said, pointing to a fox carrying a ptarmigain in its mouth. “That took me two years to finish.”

The mount took so long because of all the pieces needed, mostly forms that are made in the Lower 48 and shipped to Alaska. Mounts for clients don’t take that long, and Randolph guarantees completion within a year after he’s hired.

The process of mounting an animal varies from species to species, he said. The most time-consuming part of most game animal mounts is the time it takes to get the skins back from tanneries Outside. With fish mounts, the most effort goes into painting and getting the color patterns just right.

Randolph said the best way for people to ensure they get a good mount is to properly take care of the skin or head by cleaning it quickly and keeping it cool. With fish, the best thing to do is take lots of pictures. Most fish mounts he does, he said, are replicas based on photos taken of fish that have been released.

“Most places these guys are catching fish it’s all catch and release,” he said. “Once I get the pictures, I put all the color back into the fish exactly like he caught it.”

Randolph said he works closely with clients to give them a personalized mount that can serve as a lasting memory. With one particular sheep mount, he said the hunter shot part of the ram’s horn and initially wanted Randolph to cover the blemish. Randolph said no, telling the man the mount would be distinctive.

“Now you’ve got a great story,” he said.

Later, the man returned to Randolph and told him how happy he was with the decision to leave the horn with a piece missing.

“He goes, ‘I’m glad you never patched that for me,’” he said.

Randolph said he takes a great amount of pride in his art and tries to do whatever he can to accommodate his clients’ needs.

“You can call me any time of night and I’ll open the door and let you in,” he said.

That dedication last through the mounting process all the way until the animal is picked up from Randolph’s shop.

“I’m always walking out the door with them making sure it’s just how they want,” he said.

Randolph will be at the outdoors show at the Menard Center in Wasilla through its conclusion Sunday. The event — which runs Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. — includes 175 vendor booths as well as a gun show in the upstairs seating area. Entry fee is $5.

Contact Frontiersman editor Matt Tunseth at 352-2268 or matt.tunseth@frontiersman.com