11-year old hunts, traps, and runs his own taxidermy business – InForum

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DETROIT LAKES — Most 11-year boys are busy with video games, spring baseball or skateboarding.
Then there’s Grayson Goheen of rural Detroit Lakes.
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He already has his own business: Bubba’s Euros.
Grayson’s specialty is trapping, hunting and creating European mounts for customers. All at the age of 11.
On Monday, May 11, he was bleaching a skull.
“I have a white-tailed deer head and I am painting the bleach on so that it will get more white,” he said.
“From start to finish, if I work nonstop, this will take me about two weeks,” Grayson said of the time and effort that goes into a mount.
Grayson has been doing this since he was a kindergartner. Now it is part of his Bubba’s Euros business. European mounts is a taxidermy style that features a cleaned, or whitened, animal skull.
“My dad and I did a muskrat and a beaver and a mink, and I was 5 then,” he said.
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And it’s not like Grayson just picked up this hobby.
“When I was younger, I just enjoyed being outside, and that started it all,” he said.
“This was my first skull, it is a beaver,” he said, holding up a small beaver skull.
He does nearly all of the work. Cutting up, skinning the hide before it is sent to a tanner.
He also does turkey fans — a spread of the tail feathers of a wild turkey mounted as a hunting trophy.
“That was my first turkey up there,” Grayson said, pointing to a turkey fan.
“These take me about a week,” he said of the impressive turkey fan he is currently working on.
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All of this from a boy who has taxidermy on his radar as a career.
“I never thought I would be doing this at this point in my life, but I am 100% guaranteed I am going to do this when I get older,” Grayson said.
And for that future 18th birthday? No Disneyworld for Grayson. He has a dream trip planned:
“I am going to Africa for my senior trip. Crocodile, gemsbok (antelope) and blue wildebeest are on my list,” Grayson said.

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