Pet preservation now takes up the bulk of Beverly’s practice, followed by couture and decorative work, including jewelry and furniture. Hunter’s trophy work isn’t really her thing, but when she does it, she said, she’ makes a point of eating at least some of the animal to honor it. She has sampled coyote and fox.

Some of taxidermy’s old guard frowns on pet preservation. “They feel if you’re doing dogs and cats, you’re cheapening the art,” she said.

But Beverly isn’t the old guard. She’s a member of MART — the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists. A group with national members, its name speaks for itself.

Art to taxidermy

Taxidermy wasn’t always the plan. After high school, Beverly studied jewelry design at the Tyler School of Art. She also went to circus school to train on the trapeze. For a time, she found employment as a simulated patient for medical training.

While working as a window dresser for Daffy’s, the now-defunct discount retailer in Center City, Beverly started noticing dead birds during her lunch breaks.

“It broke my heart that they were just going to either rot on the sidewalk or get stepped on, so I just started picking them up and taking them home,” Beverly said.

There she would remove a wing, marvel at its beauty and think: “Wouldn’t that be pretty in my hair?”

So she got a book on taxidermy from the library and tried to teach herself. Family and friends were unfazed.

“They were basically like, ‘Oh that Beth. This is her next thing.’”

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