full size deer form and legs, soft rear legs

subject: full sized white tail deer form
problem: rear legs "soft"

this weekend mounted a life size white tail, o hell its ugly and all ,but what a great experience!
but after shaving the rear lower part of legs down, yes it has metal rods in it, when i put the skin on the form, it bowed down!
needless to say the animal has the im shocked going to spring away look, but that isnt what i was after.
what i wonder is , are all forms like this for large life size? this form has what i would call normal form foam body, but the legs where cast in some kind of soft foam,, which was hard to carve .
should i have added more metal rods to the rear legs?
also do you all arm wrestle at your conventions? i would think full time taxidermists are super strong! lol

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What you have is a flex-form

Not one of my favorite forms, but you are there now. Bend the legs into the desired Poisson, remember the straighter the leg the better support you will have. Then brace the mount into the pose you want. when the hide, and glue dries a lot of the moisture and weight will be gone, the mount will be better able to support itself. The problem with the flex-forms, is they are designed to be posed a bit. in order to make the legs possible, they give up some support. next time choose a rigid form.

Flexi-forms in a l/s deer?

I didn't realize that. All I'd seen was the ones for small/med mammals. I can see why he had so many problems.....

thanks

that makes sense tenbears thanks! ( live and learn)