Editorial Standards

Taxidermy Hobbyist is a small independent publisher writing about a craft that's misunderstood, regulated unevenly, and surrounded by confusing pricing. Our goal is to be the resource we wish existed when we were first trying to understand it. This page describes how we work, what we publish, how we verify it, and how we make money.

What we publish

Original guides, cost analyses, legal explainers, and a directory of working taxidermists. We focus on questions hunters, hobbyists, and pet owners actually ask, written by people with hands-on experience or, in topics where we don't have direct expertise, with clearly-cited subject-matter sources.

We don't republish content from other sites. We don't buy syndicated articles. We don't auto-generate guides without human writing and editing.

How we verify what we publish

Pricing datais gathered from public taxidermist rate sheets, industry forum discussions, the National Taxidermists Association's published guidance, and direct conversations with working taxidermists. We update pricing at least once a year and date each guide accordingly. When we cite a price range, we picked the lowest and highest credible figures we found, not a single source's quote.

Legal information about hunting regulations, migratory bird permits, endangered species, and similar topics is sourced from federal regulatory text (USFWS, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the Endangered Species Act, CITES) and verified state wildlife agency websites. We are not lawyers and do not provide legal advice. When readers face a specific permit question, we recommend contacting their state wildlife agency directly. Regulations change. If you spot an outdated reference, please tell us.

Directory listingsare verified before publication. We confirm each business has an active phone number, a real address, and either a website or other reachable presence. Listings flagged as “Pending Verification” haven't yet been confirmed by a member of our team. We re-verify directory entries annually, and we remove businesses that report as closed or that we cannot reach for two consecutive verification cycles.

Product recommendationsare based on either direct use or research-driven evaluation. When we haven't personally used a product, we say so. We do not accept payment from manufacturers in exchange for inclusion in our guides.

Corrections

We make mistakes. When we do, we fix them, usually within one business day of being notified, and add a note at the top or bottom of the affected page describing what changed and when.

To report a correction, email layne@sceptermarketing.com with the URL and what's wrong. We take corrections seriously and respond to all of them.

How we make money

We are a for-profit business, not a non-profit. We support the site through:

• Display advertisingthrough Google AdSense. Ads are clearly labeled as such by Google's standard formats. We don't disguise advertising as editorial.
• Affiliate linksto retailers like Amazon, McKenzie Taxidermy Supply, and Van Dyke's Taxidermy Supply. When we link to a product through an affiliate program, we earn a small commission if you buy. This never costs you more. We disclose affiliate relationships at the top of any guide that contains them, in plain English (“This guide contains affiliate links, we may earn a small commission on purchases at no extra cost to you”).
• Featured directory placementfor taxidermists who want premium visibility. Featured listings are clearly marked as “Featured” and ranked separately from organic listings. Paying for a featured listing does not influence editorial coverage and does not affect a business's eligibility for inclusion in any of our guides.

What we don't do

• Sponsored editorial content (paid articles disguised as guides).
• Paid placement in cost comparisons or “best of” rankings.
• Affiliate links inside the directory's organic results.
• Selling or sharing reader email addresses.

Editorial independence

No advertiser, affiliate partner, or featured directory member has the right to review or approve our editorial content before it's published. We've turned down advertising relationships that came with strings attached. If we ever publish a piece that involves a financial relationship beyond standard advertising or affiliate links, we'll disclose it prominently at the top of the article.

Use of AI

We use AI tools in our editorial process, for research summarization, fact-finding, draft generation, and copyediting. Every guide is reviewed and substantively edited by a human editor before publication. We do not publish raw AI output. AI tools have known limitations around factual accuracy, especially on regulatory topics and pricing. Our verification process is designed to catch and correct these.

Privacy

How we handle personal information is described in our Privacy Policy.