Artists’ Touch On Wildlife

By: Barbara Ennen

When you think of wildlife art you may think of pictures or paintings of wildlife, yet there is another type of wildlife art called taxidermy. It takes someone very creative to mold animals into life like works of art.

Trails End Taxidermy is located twelve miles southeast of Bismarck on a family farmstead giving it that wildlife feel. When walking into his shop you can see how much he loves the art of his taxidermy work. The office area is arranged with wildlife mounts from exotic animals to everyday birds, pheasants, ducks, squirrels and fish all on display for customers to admire.

Wes Ennen says, “Spending a lot of time in nature hunting is what drew me to taxidermy because of the beauty of the animals.”

Ennen owner of Trails End Taxidermy has been a taxidermist for 61 years and is a  lifelong hunter and outdoors men and has the unique ability to mount animals like they look in nature and he can add the touches that make them look real. Being a hunter is an important factor you need to know the stance, looks and reaction so you can capture that in the mount.

He said, “Not a lot of people want to do taxidermy because of what it involves.”

Many hours are spent on skinning the animal hide. After skinning them you need to remove any fat on the hides. Then on to the tanning process which takes days. After tanning you need to mount the hides on forms and then the creative work comes in, there may be repairs that need to be made. There is countless hours spent to detail whether it be spray painting a fishes design or molding a deer head there is a lot of work that goes in to one mount although, Ennen says, “The long hours are worth it when done.”

The taxidermy business has been a great business for Ennen because he’s doing something he loves but also because he has made lifelong friendships in the customers he has. To show his appreciation for his customers and friends every year Wes has an open house show casing the deer heads he mounted that deer season. This is a time for customers to get together talk about their love of the sport, share stories about their big buck or have their deer head scored to see who has the biggest rack and have a chance at winning a free deer head mount which is worth around five-hundred dollars.

“This is my way to show my customers how much I appreciate their business and the friendships that I have made, I always have a great time at the open house and people really enjoy being able to see what size buck someone else got.”

When speaking with Gail Gordon she says,” I love coming every year to see the mounts Wes has done and he just has the eye for getting everything perfect, I have never been dissatisfied.”

Art can be countless different things and each person may have different taste in what they think art is, For nature lovers and hunters taxidermy is an art to them. Ennen has made taxidermy his art because of his love of nature.