I am very interested in taxidermy but I am wondering what type of bussiness this really is? In other words can I make a good living from doing this? Please any one that does this for a living help. I am trying to find out as much as I can before making an invesment.
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I saw your post from yesterday and Roy's responce was excelent. My situation is Identical to his. But just to add a few things; regardless of where you live etc. you need to find out if it's for you before you invest a bunch of money on equip. and supplies, only to post them in the for sale catagory a year later. There are a few ways of doing this. If you're lucky like I was you can work for a taxidermist for a while. If you're on your own you can buy enough training material and bare necessities to do it and learn by trial and error. thats ok and you'll have fun but it's a little tougher and more work. After three years I just last night ordered a fleshing wheel, (I'll not say which one so as not to start that debate again). It wasn't cheap but I now know that I'm going to be doing this for the rest of my life, and I'm starting to get enough work to justify it. If you've got a lot of time and money I guess you could go to one of the schools, but check the archives in the training section first.
As far as making a good living from it, that is totally possible but yes, you do have to have a good location, good buisiness sense, and above all, quality work. And it will probably take some time before you can do it full time. So you'd have to work elswhere or have a big savings account while you started.
I started at late age and love doing it as a hobbie/2nd income now, and it's going to allow me to retire at 55 and do what I love so my situation is a little diferent. Not having to rely on it for my sole income also means I can spend hunting season hunting, which I love to do also. I have a friend that taught me taxidermy that doesn't go hunting anymore so he can stay home and receive work.
So find a way to try it and if you like it, go for it. It won't take to long to find out if it will work for you. even if you don't do it for a living you still can enjoy the rewards of doing quality mounts for you and others.
sorry for the long post, but I think if I put it here instead of e-mailing, others can add their thoughts. Good Luck, Carl