Advice/Experiences on Foam Body Forms

Hello All,

I'm an avian taxidermist mostly working on small song birds. I'm looking to expand into foam body forms now. Any advice on your experience working with custom foam bodies for small birds is very much appreciated. Pro's - Con's?


My questions are:

What type of foam do you recommend?

What tools will I need to carve/shape the foam?

Where do you think I should purchase such supplies from? (I'm guessing Mackenzie)


Thanks you for your time!

 

I was tempted to try the balsa wood next but decided on foam instead. This is great knowledge, I'm ordering some foam and a rasp this evening. Very excited to try my hand at foam bodies in addition to wrapped wood excelsior bodies. I think versatility in multiple kinds of body forms will be great. Thank you!!

 

Ron, I had that thought too. But my concern was that of Museum Man's...the inadequacy of strength of floral foam to support that of wires.


I've since ordered some balsa foam blocks from blick art materials for practice:

https://www.dickblick.com/products/balsa-foam/

I'll let you know how their strength works out, pros/cons. After I work through those balsa foam blocks, I'm going to make some 'bird loaf' as museum man suggests.


Thanks for both of your input on the questions!

 

I aim to try balsa some time in the future after foam. I've seen great results with it on other Taxidermists work.

 

So to follow up about my experience with the balsa foam blocks...

It’s density has proven easy to carve yet strong enough to hold wire (18-27 gauge). For anyone wanting to try this material out, I only recommend it for small birds. Larger birds will use lower gauge wire (8-16) hence the body material will have to be dense enough (8lb foam) to support the larger gauge wire. You can purchase balsa foam from @blickartmaterials. It’s a wee bit messy but so much more fun than wrapping wood wool forms. A good shop vac should clean up the pil-o-dust pretty easily.

Also, wear eye protection/mask when working with this material. It does have some weight to individual particles but if you get a breeze or let out a big SIGH after carving 40 bodies in a row..you might get some dust going airborne, so protect those peepers and airways!!

You do have to be careful not to tug wire to fast or in the wrong direction when placing in your foam form, as it will rip through the foam. But the results are great and make for a very smooth, groomed bird in the end.