Rubberhead
AH fanatic
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2021
- Messages
- 582
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- Location
- South Carolina
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- www.flickr.com
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- 39
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- 5
- Hunted
- South Carolina, South Africa
So, I didn't get much "taxidermy" work done as a result of my first safari: 2 skins, 2 skulls, and some warthog teeth. I waited, very patiently, I might add, for more than a year to get my stuff finished and shipped from RSA. The crate arrived on July 18th full of stuff that I already loved. It wasn't a huge crate and it wasn't made with top-quality wood but something happened that I didn't expect...I fell in love the with crate too.
Like I said, the wood wasn't top quality. It originated in South Africa but the materials looked exactly like the plywood and lumber I'd get at my local Lowes. I feel certain the stuff was cut from trees grown in Africa but it looks and smells like US pine. The build quality of the crate itself was pretty astounding, though. Everybody's taxidermy order from Africa is different yet this crate was perfectly designed for exactly my order. It wasn't designed by a computer and manufactured by machines in lots of 100,000. A human, probably without using a computer or even paper and pencil, optimized this one-of-a-kind design to reduce the volume and weight while ensuring the structural rigidity necessary to protect my treasures for a trip halfway around an uncaring world. There wasn't any wasted space or wood. It was exactly what it needed to be. Amazing considering the odd shapes of the wildebeest and impala skulls.
I thought about the artisan that built the box. He's probably underpaid and overworked by the standards of most modern countries. I'm sure he went home tired with only the hopes and dreams of just doing it all over again the next day. But, he's got more skills that 90%+ of the Starbucks suckers in the US or Europe. And, I bet he laughed, bantered and smiled more in the day he made my crate than most of Starbucks patrons do in a month too. I tipped everyone I met in Africa...how'd I miss this guy? He deserved it as much as anyone.
Knowing all of this, I couldn't just throw away his work. I used it as a prop in some photography then moved it to the screened-in back porch as something like a coffee table. I've eaten diner on it a few times and sat, many hours, with my feet up on it after diner. My wife hasn't complained. The stickers, stamps, and signatures it gained as it made its way from South Africa to Istanbul, Turkey then finally to Atlanta, Georgia made it something of a welcomed traveler in our home but the time came where I had to do something with it before I break a toe on one of it's well-manufactured corners.
My closest friend liked it so much that he suggested using it as a part of the taxidermy display, but I barely have a place for the taxidermy, much less the box it came it. My wife mentioned just leaving it as-is for a while and use it as storage in our crawl space. By the way, I can stand straight up in our "crawlspace" and, because I'm a duck hunter, use the area for storing all the cool stuff that comes with being a waterfowler like decoys, fake plastic ducks, fake solid ducks and some decoys.
I was starting to believe that I was just going to offer it up for free on our neighborhood facebook page. I let that thought run to conclusion and realized nobody was going to love that box as much I as do and they'd probably just dismantle it and use it for scrapes. So, I decided to dismantle it and use it for scraps. At least, that way, I can save the side panel with the most character, stamps, writing, stickers and documentation for last...just in case I want to make it part of the taxidermy display it somehow.
Dismantling it was rather easy because, unlike my own projects, the screws the crate's creator used were all the same size and head design. My stuff usually has a mixture of different size slotted, phillips, torx, square-head, usually a hex-head or two thrown in. I took it all apart and moved the bottom, top and side panels into the crawlspace. The remaining pile of 2" x 2" pieces left me uninspired for a little while because I have a bunch of 2x2 scrap already. Then it hit me.
These pieces are the perfect size to burn in our fire pit. When the kids and the grand kids come over this fall, we can sit in the backyard around a real African fire made with real African wood and enjoy the evening. Those that couldn't or wouldn't go to Africa with me can still experience one of the most pleasant and memorable things about Africa - an African fire.
Then, as is my habit, I just couldn't leave well enough alone...I seem to recall one of the African trackers telling me of a tree in Africa that when it's burned produces a deadly toxic smoke. Now that I think about it, maybe I'll just throw the stuff away.
Like I said, the wood wasn't top quality. It originated in South Africa but the materials looked exactly like the plywood and lumber I'd get at my local Lowes. I feel certain the stuff was cut from trees grown in Africa but it looks and smells like US pine. The build quality of the crate itself was pretty astounding, though. Everybody's taxidermy order from Africa is different yet this crate was perfectly designed for exactly my order. It wasn't designed by a computer and manufactured by machines in lots of 100,000. A human, probably without using a computer or even paper and pencil, optimized this one-of-a-kind design to reduce the volume and weight while ensuring the structural rigidity necessary to protect my treasures for a trip halfway around an uncaring world. There wasn't any wasted space or wood. It was exactly what it needed to be. Amazing considering the odd shapes of the wildebeest and impala skulls.
I thought about the artisan that built the box. He's probably underpaid and overworked by the standards of most modern countries. I'm sure he went home tired with only the hopes and dreams of just doing it all over again the next day. But, he's got more skills that 90%+ of the Starbucks suckers in the US or Europe. And, I bet he laughed, bantered and smiled more in the day he made my crate than most of Starbucks patrons do in a month too. I tipped everyone I met in Africa...how'd I miss this guy? He deserved it as much as anyone.
Knowing all of this, I couldn't just throw away his work. I used it as a prop in some photography then moved it to the screened-in back porch as something like a coffee table. I've eaten diner on it a few times and sat, many hours, with my feet up on it after diner. My wife hasn't complained. The stickers, stamps, and signatures it gained as it made its way from South Africa to Istanbul, Turkey then finally to Atlanta, Georgia made it something of a welcomed traveler in our home but the time came where I had to do something with it before I break a toe on one of it's well-manufactured corners.
My closest friend liked it so much that he suggested using it as a part of the taxidermy display, but I barely have a place for the taxidermy, much less the box it came it. My wife mentioned just leaving it as-is for a while and use it as storage in our crawl space. By the way, I can stand straight up in our "crawlspace" and, because I'm a duck hunter, use the area for storing all the cool stuff that comes with being a waterfowler like decoys, fake plastic ducks, fake solid ducks and some decoys.
I was starting to believe that I was just going to offer it up for free on our neighborhood facebook page. I let that thought run to conclusion and realized nobody was going to love that box as much I as do and they'd probably just dismantle it and use it for scrapes. So, I decided to dismantle it and use it for scraps. At least, that way, I can save the side panel with the most character, stamps, writing, stickers and documentation for last...just in case I want to make it part of the taxidermy display it somehow.
Dismantling it was rather easy because, unlike my own projects, the screws the crate's creator used were all the same size and head design. My stuff usually has a mixture of different size slotted, phillips, torx, square-head, usually a hex-head or two thrown in. I took it all apart and moved the bottom, top and side panels into the crawlspace. The remaining pile of 2" x 2" pieces left me uninspired for a little while because I have a bunch of 2x2 scrap already. Then it hit me.
These pieces are the perfect size to burn in our fire pit. When the kids and the grand kids come over this fall, we can sit in the backyard around a real African fire made with real African wood and enjoy the evening. Those that couldn't or wouldn't go to Africa with me can still experience one of the most pleasant and memorable things about Africa - an African fire.
Then, as is my habit, I just couldn't leave well enough alone...I seem to recall one of the African trackers telling me of a tree in Africa that when it's burned produces a deadly toxic smoke. Now that I think about it, maybe I'll just throw the stuff away.
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