Tagging the Deer

It’s been almost 2 years since I finished Chemo. The process left me intact for the most part. However, I have discovered holes in my memory. A lot of peripheral things just disappeared. I’m fine now. New stuff goes into the memory banks and stays there just like it used to. However, bits and pieces just got burned out of my head.

Shortly after Turkey Season ended, I was sitting in my office, drinking my coffee like I always do, and looked up at the wall. There were three sets of antlers up there. I tried every which way, and I could not remember when and where I’d taken the deer. I looked around the room, and I realized I had found one of the memory holes. The racks all looked familiar, but being able to say “I tagged him in 1991 in Switzerland County” was no longer a sure thing.

Luckily, I’ve got this weblog. It took a couple of hours of digging. However, I drew a map of the room and went to the blog and researched every kill and recorded the date and stand location.

I then went on eBay and found a guy selling brass engraved plates, 1″X 3.” Quantity 1 price was under $2.50. I contacted him and ordered a whole slew of them and got a decent discount. They arrived in under a week. I then went about mounting the plates to the appropriate rack.

Method

I used Gorilla 5-Minute Epoxy for the whole job. With the racks that are affixed to wooden plaques, I roughed up the back of the plate with 60 Grit sandpaper and then did the same to a spot on the wood– just enough to remove the finish. I mixed up a dab of epoxy using small spatulas made from wood scraps, and then applied it to the plate, staying well away from the edges. I pressed the plate on the plaque and lightly pressed. I then let each plaque sit overnight.

For the taxidermy mounts and for the racks not on wood plaques, I had some thin crosscut slabs of cedar. I had gotten them years ago for another project that didn’t turn out. They were perfect for this application. I resorted to E-Bay again and found brass key chains. I took two chains and put them together. First I lightly glued the chain to the back of the slab and positioned it properly with a toothpick. After that setup, I came back and dropped a big glob of epoxy to embed the chain thoroughly. My guess is the chain will break before the epoxy gives.