The ethics surrounding taxidermy is something that I am constantly re-evaluating. Keeping my moral compass in line with the direction in which I want to travel with my craft, is something that is very important to me – keeping natures best interest at the forefront of my brand.
Trending Taxidermy
As taxidermy has become more popular in recent years, the demand for deceased specimens has increased substantially. Unlike when I first started my journey a decade ago, it has become increasingly rare in that people donate specimens to me as a kind gesture, simply because they don’t want a beautiful animal to go to waste.
I get the odd, like-minded kind soul of course that is still willing to simply donate something they have found, that I am extremely grateful for! But now, it’s far more common for people to ask how much I will pay for ‘x’ specimen they have just found, as if they think the poor creature that has just lost it’s life (mostly at the fault of man), owes them something.
Furthermore, what annoys me the most in the case of CITES listed species (i.e, owls and other birds of prey), is when I alert such a person that they indeed need an Article 10 Licence to legally sell such a specimen. They then realise it’s not financially worth their while and refuse to donate it anyway, on that principle and probably end up just disposing of the creature.
A growing greed
I have noticed the same is generally true of members of aviculture community and I have had the same situation; where breeders have disposed of specimens by putting them in the bin, purely because it’s not financially worth their while to buy a license to sell the carcass.
I know that alive birds can fetch a pretty penny, but quite frankly, once deceased their financial value should be close to zero.
Please don’t think I am like a child stomping my feet because I feel like I am somehow deserving of ‘free’ specimens…I’m not and I will never think that. I am just trying to highlight the greed and immoral thought processes of others, that are supposedly in an industry that cares for the welfare of their animals.
But, surely, if they are seeking to make maximum profit from their deceased stock, maybe they are best suited to being in the beef/pork/meat industry?
As mentioned in my previous blog about why taxidermy is expensive, it’s largely the artistic licence, dedication to the craft and skill required that goes in to a piece of taxidermy that reflects the price. This isn’t something that sellers of deceased animals should take in to consideration when offering specimens to taxidermists. Yet, many do.
Byproduct analogy
Consider this scenario; If an oil painter, who just sold a masterpiece at a price significantly higher than their usual sales, buys oil paint from an art supplies shop, would it be reasonable for the store to increase the paint’s price by a factor equal to the artist’s recent success? I don’t think so.
Or a better analogy yet; imagine if someone started making a living out of constructing houses out of cardboard boxes from Amazon, would it make sense for me to start selling my recycling waste to them for profit? No! Because I am not buying products from Amazon in order to obtain the boxes. They are a byproduct to me that holds no value and I am not going to do anything with it other than putting it in the bin.
Quite possibly some of the most outrageous deadstock sales, come from gamekeepers. Not only are they already being payed to slaughter wildlife by estate owners to increase game bird yields for the shooting season, these individuals then have the audacity to sell the animals, for more money.
Just to be completely transparent, at the beginning of my career I did purchase specimens from gamekeepers, because it was a reliable way of acquiring animals that I just thought were going to be thrown in to a ‘rot pit’ and I felt in a selfish way I was saving these poor creatures by giving them some sort of dignified end where they were cared for. But learning about the ins and outs of the shooting industry as years have gone by, I soon realised I didn’t want to be any part of it.
Are taxidermists the problem?
When it comes down to it, taxidermists are fundamentally the problem here. It only takes one person to pay a high price for a specimen, to set a precedent for the base price thereafter.
I personally feel uncomfortable paying anything more than 20% of the price of what the animal was worth when it was alive. I’d like to mention too, that there is NO guarantee working with a biological material such as deceased specimens, that everything will go to plan.
Having to unexpectedly abort taxidermy projects because of unavoidable bacterial issues that cause feathers to ‘slip’ is a frequent occurrence.
My fundamental worry is that competition among taxidermists to acquire advertised deceased specimens, no matter how rare, will drive the demand and value of dead animals higher and if the price someone pays for a specimen becomes higher or equal to the value of it when it was alive, we enter immoral territory.
If breeders and owners of animals realise their dead animals are worth more than their alive ones, it may incentivise the dispatch of healthy animals for the purpose of taxidermy to make quick money. If taxidermists drive the value of deceased wild animals, It may also increase the risk of poaching, too, which is always something at the forefront of my mind when I see dead specimens advertised for sale.
I have personally heard of such acts taking place from acquaintances of wildfowl farmers, whereby owners have actually slaughtered their healthy peacocks to sell to taxidermists, because they get a better/equal value for them as opposed to their ‘alive’ value. To me, that is unacceptable, probably illegal and totally immoral.
The answer?
Well, I’m really not sure what the answer here is, but to conclude, I definitely think that there should be some sort of licence or law in place that puts a price cap on unprocessed, raw specimens to safeguard the welfare and future of wildlife.