Madison, Andy Nimmons bring home ribbons, gold medals and award
Madison Nimmons found her passion for taxidermy after initially pursuing a career in agriculture education and learning how to mount a duck her junior year of college.
“I just fell in love with mounting birds,” she said. “Teaching, you don’t really make a lot of money. I’m kind of OCD, and it takes a lot of patience to get every feather lined up right, (but) I absolutely love mounting birds.”
Madison and her dad Andy, who are Lexington residents, competed in the North Carolina Taxidermist’s Association summer show and competition in Greensboro, North Carolina, earlier this month, taking home awards for all 10 of their pieces.
“I haven't been doing taxidermy very long,” Madison said. “So I wanted to start competing, and my dad being a world champion, he is the best of the best. He wanted to be kind of like a guide.”
Andy, who owns Andy Nimmons Taxidermy, said there were 211 total entries, which is “a lot for a state show,” ranging from “birds to just about any mammal you can think of, fish and everything.”
He added that he and Madison won nine ribbons, two gold medals, a People’s Choice award, an award for best game head and the best in category for a skin fish mount. Madison said she entered multiple birds into the waterfowl division, placing first, second and third. Andy also was named state champion for his boar head.
“I did win a blue ribbon, so that was really exciting for me,” Madison said. “Just seeing my dad win (as) state champion after he hasn’t competed since 2005, it kind of lets me know he still has it. He does know what he’s talking about.”
Additionally, one of their pieces involving a life-size kangaroo mount earned first place overall in a collaborative entry category.
Madison said they started working on the kangaroo “months in advance,” spending between 12 hours sewing the animal together and roughly 400 hours on detail work.
“You’re basically looking for overall symmetry throughout the whole entire mount,” she said. “You want your mount with perfect detail. Every feather has to be in place. If there’s a hair out of place, you get docked the point.”
As a first-time competitor, Madison said it was special to compete with her dad and that she “(learned) a lot.”
“What better way to show her the ropes, to show her how things work, to go to the show with her,” Andy said. “I showed her how to mount birds and she’s taking it to a whole different level.”