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When I was out at American Fossil Quarry earlier this year digging for Green River fish, I came across this nice little Diplomystus dentatus. Except for missing part of the tail, it’s in good shape. It was on a much larger slab, so to make it easier to bring home I trimmed it to the shape you see here while I was at the quarry. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with it, but I’ve now decided to frame it and give it as a Christmas gift. The shape didn’t lend itself to easy framing, so I decided to make sort of a shadow-box frame. I went to the local Home Depot and picked up a strip of walnut 1½ inches wide by ¼ inch thick and cut it down to be 1 inch wide. I ran it through my router table to cut a ledge along the bottom edge for the back to slip in, then cut the single long board into the four sides. I used a disk sander to put 45-degree bevels in the edges, then glued it all together, stained it, and gave it a clear-coat finish. (I don’t have photos of these initial steps). I cut the back to size from a piece of ¼ inch thick MDF board. I wanted a black background for the fish, so I cut a piece of black velvet and used spray adhesive to hold it down on the MDF. I didn’t want to glue the fish to the velvet, so I cut out an area that allowed me to epoxy the fish directly to the MDF board. I also printed a small label on my laser printer, glued it to a piece of thick mounting board, and used an X-acto knife to cut it to size. Again, I didn’t want to glue this to the velvet, so I cut out a small area for the label. I also attached a sawtooth hanger to the back of the MDF so it can be hung on a wall. I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. Here are a few pictures along the way: Original slab: Walnut frame with velvet backing applied and hole cut out to allow fish to be epoxied to MDF backing: Fish set into frame with label:
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