.

For your first umpteen duck mounts, unless you are phenom, don't worry about injecting the feet, just worry about getting other more visible parts of the anatomy correct. Once you are confident in that you then can learn to inject feet.

 

I never used it yet but one of the members on here used Gorilla Glue with lacquer thinner.

 

The marrow is in the femur bone so when you remove the hip joint ball stick a wire down in there and push the marrow out and flush with water. I understand your point about wanting to get it right but if it was that important to you, would you still be concerned about the cost of shipping of masters blend? I'm not trying to come across as abrasive but even if you have the best up to date materials readily available, your first attempt without instruction is likely to be less than ok, so mount it up as is and the feet will still be present albeit shrunken some but they will still be there as long as you care to look at your first mount anyway, unless like I already stated by some fluke, you are a phenom.

 

Any of the readily available injections are not cheap and without good instruction can take many attempts to get it right. I've tried many things that are available locally and cannot find anything with acceptable results. The best result was with a clear ultima caulk thinned with xylol but it was a real pain in the arse and took forever to set up. Unless you use a 2 part epoxy the skin like is injecting into a plastic bag which severely decreases drying. good lcuk

 

McKenzie is super expensive when it comes to shipping. There are many supply companies that have what you will need and shipping will be much less in most cases.

You can paint with artist brushes with your paints. I always recommend having everything you need ready including; all materials to prepare the form and skin, all materials to mount, all the materials to finish, lots of reference and at least one DVD by a well known/respected taxidermist from a taxidermy supply company or equivalent, not Youtube, way before you start. And it looks like you are well on your way with your research and such, so, good for you! When it comes time, you'll be ready for sure.

Since you want this to be the best it can be, which I applaud you for, respectfully, I would wait on the project and save money so you can get the best materials and such and then proceed. The reason I am telling you this is because taxidermy is very expensive and you will always have to save for a mount.

Since I retired from taxidermy, I have found that mounts I would like to do for myself are out of my price range and it might take a year before I have enough money to do the mount. I know this sucks because I want to get it down now, not wait a year, however, the wait is worth it.
Looking forward to seeing your duck when your done.

 

Always a potential problem with feet on the larger birds, particularly waterfowl:
grease! Every taxidermist's waiting sabatour. Drill its, 1/8 inch on up will
"twist" the grease and marrow out of the
tarsi. Or check out artificial cast feet for various species. Or learn to cast your own, not that difficult. I have mounted
many sandhill cranes, and you definitely
want to use cast farsi for those, also for swans and Canada geese, emperor geese and the like. Stay with it, look to become the competition for us old guys!

 

...TARSI, NOT FARSI...TYPO

 

I have read articles on casting bird feet. It seemed to be a rather simple process, however a little spendy upfront from what I remember.

 

Where are you from there might be a supply company closer to you to save shipping

 

I believe that on small orders, if you specify "US Mail" the rate will be waaaay less. UPS and FEDEX are ruthless. You will wait a little longer for you order to arrive by mail, but it should be considerably cheaper.

 

For me, I always go USPS for smaller stuff. The last time I ordered from McKenzie, it took 3 or 4 days longer to get than when I go the UPS route and the cost of shipping was at least 1/3 less than other carriers. It was kind of hard to do an exact comparison because I rarely do anything taxidermy anymore, so shipments a few and far between and I don't keep records anymore since I retired, there is no need.