While at school they told us to figure a minmum of 12 hours. Thats been a few years ago. I figure 2 hours customer time minimum. 15 minutes to measure. 1 hour to skin. 2 hours to flesh and salt. 1.5 hours to prep manikin, set antlers, set eyes. 3-5 hours of mounting and pinning time. 2 hours to trim, epoxy nose, eyes, etc....Another 30 min to paint and tone everything. Another 30 minutes to do last minute finish work to it all. Figure 30 minutes time to order form etc....Then of course there are things like taking to tannery and picking up etc... the things you never add in.

Thats 13.25 to 15.25 hours and it always seemed like by the time I was done and added it all together including answering the phone etc.... it basically burned up 2 total days.

How long in days from start to finish? depends on how much work I had backlogged. A year is common, less is better. Of course you need to have enough work to last you all year so a year to get a mount back is about what I expect. Time wise it takes me about 2 weeks to get to fleshing and salting and tagging. 3 months is pretty average for a local tannery to do wet tans. Measure and have forms a week or two later. Mount in the next few weeks. Let dry a month or more depending on conditions. Paint drying at least one week minimum. Shortest time frame would be 6 months on a deer head. Other variables as to tannery time can change that. Usually adding to the time frame.

And non of the above is considering the time to seperate horn cores, clean the skull plate and epoxy cores back to horns.

Any other questions?

Oh yeah, I did a dry preservative quicky mount on a bet one time with a friend. Had a form that would fit. Brought deer in. 4 hours later it was mounted. Of course it was like our local taxidermists have done for years. No detail, cheap everything, no one cares. If its stuffed its good. Of course we still had to wait a few weeks plus for it to dry.