How To Do A Marsh/swamp Habitat

Ok I’m going to do this a little differently , instead of posting when I’m done , im going to post a little at a time as I’m working on it , so it might take a couple days as I’m doing a few other things at the same time around here and not in a major rush but it will be pretty detailed so follow along make comments or ask questions, this is my way so in my opinion it’s the best way lol but I’m sure not the only way . Here’s the run down, this Mount was supposed to be just a wall pedestal, and the stag was already mounted , my client saw a picture of another stag I did in a pedestal seen and said I want something like that , money is No option , who don’t like to hear that lol . My only guidance is the pedestal had to be rustic . That said I look around found a company and ordered a really nice base , not cheap but built to my specs . I didn’t want to just hang this off a backboard of the base itself so i had to make this already mounted deer free standing you might say . I’ll cover that later .

So the base was shipped from IL to DEL and I picked it up from the Fastenal store in Dover Delaware and brought it back to my shop in MD . ( ck into them for shipping and receiving big items they are very cheap )

Ok let’s get started i found the spot I wanted the stag to be and screwed the support bracket in place , even after using a level to make bracket plumb and the stags eyes level it was off slightly so I had to put washers under one side of bracket to get eyes level as you can see in pictures. So now to hide the support. I already had drift wood that I bug bombed so I found a pcs that would work and I drilled it out to fit down over it . Then I glued it in place , then took apoxeysculpt and filled in for a perfect fit . Then I put stag back in place and found a couple more pcs of drift wood I wanted to use and put them in place trying to find the look I wanted . I marked were I wanted them , That done I took those pcs out and sealed them with a clear flat finish. As that was drying I taped the top boards of the base of as I don’t want to spill or drip anything on this nice base .

That’s it for now will post more soon

 

And I got the plants stuff I’m going to use ready

 

Next I brought the drift wood pcs in , I put 5 min apoxy down in the spots and then screwed the wood in place to help hold them in place . I then taped a big bag on were I was going to carry mixed foam across as I didn’t want to take a chance of spilling even a drop of foam on this expensive base I Then I poured a 2 part foam down and smeared it across , I’m not looking for it to be thick with foam just to be uneven kinda thing . After that I started roughing it up to hold paint


SORRY FOR ANY DOUBLE POSTING OF PICTURES, not sure how but when I try to fix it I loose other pics I want you to see .

 

So after I scratched up the foam, the 125lb casters I ordered arrived so I screwed them on for easy movement and then I taped the bottoms of the drift , pushed it outside and painted the foam flat black

 

Ok so now it’s time to mix up my clean dirt , I take a bunch of different kinds of moss , some dry leaves , some grasses and frag topes . I cut smash and crunch them all up into a bucket

 

So I mixed all that together and make sure it’s not to big of pcs , now I take Peat moss and smash it in my hands and mix it to my moss and leave mix and mix it all together. Next is to get my cups and evirotex lite ready . This is a 2 part high gloss top coat you can get at most craft stores like Michaels . You can get it from McKenzie but it’s not cheap , here’s a secret if you go to Michaels web page you can get 40 to 60 % off coupons to buy it . If you notice I marked the containers for easy equal measurements. Just sit containers beside each other take a magic marker and push it in between them , spots will be exact on both bottles. Next get some solo cups and jumbo popsicle sticks . Now your ready to go , I pour equally parts so that solo cup is half full and I mix well then I add my clean dirt mix . I mix this to a peanut butter thickness. You don’t want it to soupy . But not to dry either, spreadable.

 

Now take mix and start spreading it on top of painted foam. Your only looking for a thin layer, getting it up close to all drift stumps and edges of base , don’t fill in depressions , give it contour with the highs and lows of the foam. I like to work it around the edges and stumps first then back to center . In the center I made mix a little thiner , soupy, not much . Then I took a pcs of 1x4 and cut out a hoof track and put in water to soak

 

So I have whole base mudded up and it’s time time to pull the tape off before the epoxy clear kicks off , as if any got on the base edge you can get it off now . After this I watch and wait for it to start to kick and get a little stiff . Time to make some tracks, the water soak helps some but it can still be a pain to make tracks as it will stick to wood sometimes. Ok I’m done for this part . You still need some clean dirt and EL so don’t put them away . Next step is putting grasse , frag and plants in place .

Hope some are learning things , any questions so far , ask away or give comments.
I’ll be back

 

Are all pics showing up ? I’m doing this from my phone and I see some pics and then little box’s to click on , should be 7-10 pics on each post .

 

So mud is dry and hard , now it’s time to put some plants and things in place . First tho put your mount back in place so habit don’t over power it . Your going to drill in to mud and thru ply using appropriate drill bit . If your putting a duck or small game in scene just drill holes and set in place approximately where you want it , don’t worry if you make a mistake and want to move it , I just redrill another hole and at the end just put I little mud mix in wrong hole and it’s fixed , so you can’t mess up . Also to attach everything even ducks and SG your going to 5 min epoxy in place and fill edges or under feet and such with a little more mud to hide wire or all-thread , you don’t have to bolt them down, 5 min epoxy in hole and push down till it kicks . It don’t matter if foot is not touching , as your going to fill in under foot if nessasarry with mud . So after I have animal in place I kinda hold plants were I want them to see if I like , I’ll drill hole and put it there step back, if I like , I leave and 5 min epoxy it in if not I move it and at the end fix hole . A lot of times I put plants in without glueing, leave over night come out in mourning to see if I get that wow factor , if I don’t I may move things add or take out then glue in place . Every thing can be locked in place by drilling, glueing and remudding . I wanted to add the dropped antler so I layed it where I wanted then drilled hole in mud and ran a small screw in antler where needed and glued in place . I’m done for now but will be back for final work.
STAY TUNNED LOL

 

I’m not sure what’s going on , I tried to fix but it doubled the boxes and only some pics . Try tapping on the rectangular skinny box in each post , pics should come up . Sorry

 

Ok final post . What ever you want to put in scene just drill hole and epoxy in place . For grasses and such ,just drill a bunch of holes vacuum up drill trash, now have all your grass ready . Put epoxy in all holes and put grasses in . Once you have everything you want in place mix up some more mud leaving it on the wetter side . Now go to everything you put in and put a little of that mud at bottom to hide hole , wire , screw or whatever. You can also use this mud to make a damm if needed to make a puddle. After you get this done , in a clean cup mix up some more ETL for water try to mix it slow in cup not to get to many air bubbles, if you do it’s no problem it’s an easy fix . Ok pour mix in any low spots you want a puddle, if you have bubbles take a lighter and put the flame on top of clear coat and watch the bubbles disappear, be careful not to catch any grasses on fire lol . My last note if you want mud to look wetter just mix some ETL and with a good paint brush just paint across mud , it will make it wetter looking or if in 2 years it gets dusty just paint it over the dust it will look new again . Hope I helped , thanks for following along