This month, as part of our Field Notes: Tales from a Taxidermist-in-Training series, I am so excited to share with you some of what I have learned about bone articulation! Last year when Oracle began selling these incredibly nifty articulation kits, I could not get my hands on one fast enough. I did not have any previous experience working with articulation and was nervous about making mistakes as a result, but was enchanted that these kits existed and came with nearly everything I needed to get started. The first kit I started with was a Red fox and after nearly ten months of degreasing and whitening (foxes, as I’ve come to learn now, are notoriously greasy creatures due to their diet and skin oils), it was time to begin articulating it! As I previously mentioned, I was incredibly nervous that I was going to mess up and very, very slowly began putting it back together. I spent an enormous amount of time pouring over Alessandra’s zine, The Bare Bones of Articulation, and anything I could find online about this tedious process. I started to keep a notebook where I collected all my notes, little diagrams, and drawings of what I envisioned the final result to be. This became an invaluable part of my process, and in the end, I was quite pleased with myself and my progress!

The next time around, I was feeling a bit more confident in my ability and was ready to pick up the pace with another kit. I was ecstatic to get a limited-release kit of a wolf paw and got to degreasing right away, which dramatically took less time to do than the fox. I thought it might be helpful to show you, dear reader, how I begin the process of piecing the bones back together, and share a few tips I’ve learned along the way. While I’m very much still learning, I feel like I’m making good progress in my studies of learning the bones and how they ultimately come together.

A few basic tips from a beginner-

I truly cannot recommend enough that you get yourself a copy of Alessandra’s Bare Bones of Articulation zine! For me, it was the ultimate beginner’s toolbox of resources, and it really gave me a detailed account of what I was in for through each step of the process. If you’re interested in bones or skeletal articulation, this book will be your holy grail!
Get yourself a fresh, new notebook specifically for the craft. Your notes and findings can get lost within the pages of a sketchbook that might already be full of other musings. Keep your process streamlined and the book available for new findings.
Get yourself a nice strainer basket. This will catch all of your bones when you’re cleaning out your bucket’s water during the degreasing phase. If you don’t use one while cleaning, the chances are high that you will inevitably lose at least one when you’re cleaning your water. To borrow a line from Lee Post, “A bone can get lost down the drain faster than you can say ‘shit’.”
Practice putting your bones together with white glue until you’re confident that you found the correct arrangement. I didn’t do this my first time, and I can tell you I spent so much time frustratedly picking adhesive off the tiny wrist bones. It not only is incredibly challenging to remove, but it will alter the shape of the bones, making it impossible to organically recombine together harmoniously.
Study your animal intimately through a variety of mediums. Watching YouTube videos of them out in the wild and the way they use their bodies to get around is extremely helpful for me. Pouring over National Geographic magazines to find reference images, making sketches from different angles, and reviewing illustrations of their skeletal structure also help with further studying their anatomy. Once you spend more time investing in your studies, you’ll start to see the animal in a completely new way. Afterall, you’re paying more detailed attention to the way bone fits under the muscles and skin layers, and ultimately how the body works as a whole mechanism.

While it seems like such a daunting project in the beginning, let me assure you by saying you, too, can do it! Like I previously said, I’m still learning so much of the basics, but I think it really just comes down to practice, studying, and determination. I also think that the mental pressures I put on myself ended up hindering my progress in learning this skill more than it needed to. In the long run, instead of worrying so much, I should’ve got another kit, as another round of practice under my belt. Take time to practice, to refresh your skills, and take plenty of pictures along the way. And if you do get an articulation kit, be sure to tag us on Instagram so we can see your progress! You’ve got this!

Elise Hanson
Oracle KC