There is artistry in transforming a treated animal skin draped on a Styrofoam mannequin into something that doesn’t look simply like a dead animal.

“We’re trying to bring it back to life by doing taxidermy,” said Garth Gilden, owner of Fidalgo Taxidermy outside Anacortes. “I like to see it like it’s 3-D art.”

“The best compliment you can give a taxidermist is, ‘It looks lifelike,” said Gilden’s wife Tami, who does much of the skinning and finishing work on animals that include bear, deer, wildebeest and zebras.

Ken Kingman, owner of Over the Hill Taxidermy in Clear Lake, said the greatest challenge is “getting things to look right. Anyone can put a skin on it, but getting the face right” is difficult, he said. The eyes must be focused in the same direction, not crossed. “Getting the eyes is crucial,” he said.

HANDLING PORCUPINES WITH CARE

A lifelong resident of Mount Vernon, Kingman was 14 when he spotted an advertisement in Field and Stream magazine and sent away for a 10-volume set on taxidermy. His first experiment was a crow.

“It turned out bad,” he recalled. “I pulled the feathers out of his head.” The teenage hunter concentrated solely on birds. “I wrecked a lot of them, and then things started turning out good,” Kingman said. He moved on to tackle weasels, muskrats and squirrels.

Taxidermy remained a hobby as Kingman spent his summers commercial fishing in Alaska and his winters in home construction in Washington. Tired of being mired in mud, he decided taxidermy could bring in a good retirement income.

Seven years ago, Kingman packed three deer, a badger, a bobcat, ducks and snow geese into his truck and drove off to the Northwest School of Taxidermy in Helena, Mont. He also stopped by the Missouri River to catch a fish to treat at the eight-week course. Because of his decades of bird expertise, he was allowed to skip those two weeks of lessons and spent that time working with the professionals.

In the Clear Lake shop, whose inhabitants include a squirrel sipping Seagram’s through a straw and an Armadillo on his back consuming a Lone Star beer, Kingman reanimates deceased ducks, deer, wild turkeys, cougars, bobcats, buffalo, raccoons, rabbits, bats and badgers (“They’re a nasty little animal — they’re mean”).

The most difficult might be the spiky-quilled porcupine.

“You kind of have to be gentle with them,” Kingman said, adding that the key is combing against the bristles. He’s treated brown bears, but would love to do a grizzly. The prices range from $195 for a bird to $450 for a deer. Listening to traditional country music on “Willie’s Place” on SIRIUS satellite radio, Kingman sometimes puts in 12- and 13-hour days.

Fish are challenging because Kingman chooses to shave the insides of their thin natural skin. Some taxidermists simply replace the scales with a replica skin, but Kingman believes, “They look more plastic than real.”

He brings out the colors by air brush painting the rainbow and steelhead. “You have to be careful, or you can get them off-color in a hurry,” he said.

Kingman will not preserve house pets such as dogs and cats.

“If it doesn’t look just like Fifi, you’re going to get complaints,” he said.

Kingman also turned down a request to treat half a Shetland pony. He also won’t take on dead animals that have been sitting in the back of a truck for four days, when he can see creatures moving under the skin.

THE PROCESS

On a recent day, Kingman reanimated a deer that fortunately had been left enough skin by the hunter.

“You’ve got to have that cape to get that shoulder pocket,” he pointed out. The prep work had already been performed: the skinning the meat off the skin to 1/4 to 1/8 of an inch, the soft tanning and salting of the skin. Kingman sends most of the skins for tanning to a company in Buckley, but treats some himself. Instead of putting plastic inserts into the ears like some taxidermists, Kingman opts to perk them up with Bondo putty.

Using the proper-sized deer mannequin, Kingman affixed the antlers and added glass eyes secured with clay. With a brush, he applied his own mixture of Dexter glue, paper pulp and Elmer’s glue onto the mannequin, draped the deer head over it, then fitted and secured the head with pins.

He sewed the head back together with waxed gut and used a staple gun to secure the skin, which would take a couple of days to dry. He cut off the extra fir and tossed it into the garbage can, set and trimmed the facial features, added paint to the nose and ears, and then brushed the fur.

“You have to be a beautician too,” he said.

‘IT’S FOR THE MEMORIES’

Like Kingman, Garth is an avid hunter who turned his taxidermy hobby into a business after working as a commercial fisherman in Alaska.

“I thought, ‘I shoot them, I eat them, what else can I do with this animal?”’ said the Anacortes native.

Self-taught, Garth’s first experiment was a badger his cousin brought him.

“I still have it,” he said. “The kids play with it.” He soon graduated to deer, and then water fowl.

An injury while fishing in the Bering Sea in 1989 prompted him to turn his hobby into his business, “a little out of necessity, a little out of desire.”

Working first out of his garage, his business grew from word of mouth and appearances at trade and sportsmen shows. By 1993, he was president of the Washington Taxidermy Association and earning awards for his work.

“He’s got a natural talent,” said wife Tami. “In taxidermy, you either have the talent or you don’t. You can see the hair patterns and where things are supposed to be.”

Along with ordering mannequins, Garth creates some of his own, including custom molds for the super-swelled neck and large-shouldered deer.

Fidalgo Taxidermy only treats mammals, about 300 to 400 animals a year, with a turnaround time of nine months to a year; a life-size might be two years. His prices include $630 for a deer, the most expensive $4,460 for a full-size zebra.

The most common projects, in order, are deer, beer and elk, but they also specialize in African animals such as impalas, cape buffalos, wildebeest, zebras, gemsbuck, hartebeest, lioness, warthog and blesbuck.

Finding the properly sized mannequins for exotic animals is a challenge, as well as the conditions of the skins by the time they arrive in Anacortes, Garth said.

“I swear they use spears instead of knives,” he said. “It’s rare to get a skin without a bunch of holes.”

If hunters are overzealous with their knives, spare cape skins can be added, said Garth.

“If they cut it wrong, it’s not totally ruined ... They don’t care — the face is the prize.”

Garth uses hundreds of animal photographs for reference, including shots of animals five minutes five minutes after they were killed. The details are important: What is the natural angle of the eye lashes; how are the ears arched? Customers talk about where they want the animals displayed, and Garth suggests poses; the most common is the quarter turn.

Like Kingman, Garth won’t treat house pets or bacteria-ridden carcasses where the skin is already “slipping.” He also won’t do neck mounts, like the ones seen in studies and parlors in movies.

Their home contains many of their own hunting prizes. “I never get tired of looking at them,” said Garth. “I can recall that day, or that hunt.”

So why do people mount animals in their homes?

“Some people like to do it as, ‘Mine is bigger than that.’ I like to think it’s more than that. I think they’re pretty ... It’s for the memories. Even though they have a photo, this is just so much more.”