# Brown trout mount / modifications



## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

I got my brown trout back from the taxidermist. I'm really happy with how the fish turned out. He did a great job keeping that fish true to it's natural look.

The piece of driftwood that he had it attached to is not going to work for the location we want to display the fish. It was mounted vertically, and is just a little too long that direction. So, I'm going to change things up a little. I'll use this thread to share the changes.

My plan is to get a better piece of driftwood. I have lots of options to choose from, thanks to all the recent flooding of Coal Creek. I went out yesterday and parked along the road where the Coal Creek diversion canal broke through its bank -- lots of treasures to be found! I need to clean up (pressure wash) the candidates, then make a selection. Then I'll figure out the mounting options.

to get started, here are a couple pics:







































(I've also got a 2nd chum salmon that currently is mounted to a piece of plywood painted black. I really don't like the board -- so I'm going to re-mount it to some driftwood to, to match the 1st chum -- you can see what I did with #1 in this thread: Fish taxidermy question / help)


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## lifesshort (Apr 3, 2017)

PBH said:


> I got my brown trout back from the taxidermist. I'm really happy with how the fish turned out. He did a great job keeping that fish true to it's natural look.
> 
> The piece of driftwood that he had it attached to is not going to work for the location we want to display the fish. It was mounted vertically, and is just a little too long that direction. So, I'm going to change things up a little. I'll use this thread to share the changes.
> 
> ...


I believe it is a good idea to make sure any insects living in the driftwood are dead. I do not remember the exact method but it is something like put the wood in a plastic bag throw a rag sprayed with insecticide in with it, let it sit for some time. A internet search would probably fill in the blanks.


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

Spray it all down with several coats of polyurethane, it would give it that wet, under water look... and keep any bugs sealed in. 

-DallanC


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## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

I found a piece of driftwood that I think is going to work out nicely. I pressure washed it and did some light sanding. I really like the character that driftwood carries with it. Here is the piece after cleaning it up:










I often times like to keep wood natural in color, but opted to stain this piece to match the floating shelves where it will be displayed (see pictures in first post with the fish sitting on the books). So, out came the gel stain (hickory):










Next up: two coats of polyurethane.

(I'm also working on my daughters euro deer skull, so things might slow down a bit again...)


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## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

I had a few minutes last night to work on this again.

The log has two coats of polyurethane on it now, and the hangers attached. I marked the locations for the dowels, and got them drilled. Here are the dry-fit dowels:










And, here's the fish ready for drilling the dowel holes:


















The light splotch in the middle is where the original hanger was placed by my taxidermist. I had to use the dremel to cut it off.
I got the holes drilled, and test fitted the fish on the log with the dowels. (sorry, no pics of that yet). I also measured, marked, and cut my dowels down to the right size, and then stained them last night. I should be ready to get the log hung in the living room in the next day or two, then add some glue to the dowels and put it all together. I'm happy so far!


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## neverdrawn (Jan 3, 2009)

I'm guessing it's going to turn out really nice. Beautiful mount and a ton of character in the driftwood, especially with the stain.


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## PBH (Nov 7, 2007)

I finished this up over the weekend. I'm happy -- it turned out really nice!
















































The only thing I maybe would do different, if I were to do it again, would be: orient the driftwood with the right side higher than the left side. The way it is now, the fish hides the majority of the wood. But, let's be honest: who cares about the piece of wood?


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

I like it.

My son around age 10 loved to net drift wood off the front of the boat as we trolled around our favorite lakes. Lots of that made it home... it makes me smile when I run across a piece, that he gathered over 10 years ago. 

I have a couple beautiful fish mounted from the 1980s... I wonder if I can easily mount them to a piece. One is a amazingly well done Brookie from Strawberry... yes, for those that aren't old enough, Strawberry used to have some great book trout back in the day.

-DallanC


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