Getting Animals from Zoos

[gavinm95]

I don't know if this is possible, or legal, but does anyone know if you can get/buy zoo animals that died? Like, if a gazelle died and you want to mount it?

[John C]

Just get them to do a letterhead with the gift on it. Good luck.

[mjvaden]

Privet zoo maybe...... Public zoo will dam near take an act of congress!!!! Good luck with that. In the old days the first person a zoo called when an animal died was the taxidermist. It was the noble thing to do to honor the animal. Now days zoos are largely ran and staffed by animal rights wacos and unfortunatly 99% of all the beautiful animals end up in the incinerator. It is a dam shame!!

[Ginger2000]

There goes my hope of asking Dublin Zoo about their Wolves..  Haha

[JE]

I would think most dead zoo animals will have to undergo postmortem anyhow, and I doubt they will be thinking of skinning for a taxidermist  bits and pieces may even have to be sent away for analysis as well. Zoos are extremely high tech affairs these days.
But I see no harm in asking ,
John

[grygon]

Here in Albuquerque they go to the dump.  The guy they hire to dump the bodies there has been on the news twice now for 1. putting a giraffe in a dumpster and 2. pissing his neighbors off for storing all sorts of rotting bodies on his property (even a rhino- hard to hide that!).  And nope, he isn't a skullhead.  Was just "having family problems" and couldn't be bothered to do his job right.

There are few taxidermists who seem to have the lucky way into zoo mounts, but they've been doing this a very long time and know the right people. 

[RageofAnath]

Actually a lot of zoo animals go to scientific collections for research. My boss, who is the associate curator of mammals, gets called every time any zoo animal dies at our local zoos. We skin them, take samples, and clean the bones but the skins don't get mounted.

A surprising amount of our recent acquisitions comes from zoos, probably because people don't go out and shoot giraffes for fun anymore.

[Hammer]

Grygon, I was thinking about that same guy after reading the topic. Would be nice to get my hands on something from the zoo. I might just call and ask.

[Randy Miller]

Actually a lot of zoo animals go to scientific collections for research. My boss, who is the associate curator of mammals, gets called every time any zoo animal dies at our local zoos. We skin them, take samples, and clean the bones but the skins don't get mounted.

A surprising amount of our recent acquisitions comes from zoos, probably because people don't go out and shoot giraffes for fun anymore.

Actually they do, just not many can afford to.

[Gameovertaxidermy]

It's worth a shot to try either the Como Zoo or the Minnesota Zoo both in Minnesota. I used to work for another taxidermist and I believe it was the Minnesota Zoo that actually paid us to mount a 3 legged timber wolf that was caught in a trap then lived in the zoo for like 18 years, I guess it was like a pet to them. It's either on display at the Science Museum or the Zoo. Also he called me a different time because one of those zoos contacted him about selling a tiger that had died but he didn't want to risk a few thousand on an animal that could possibly have a bad hide due being dead a day or two. Long story short they do have a history of selling some specimens.