Catoosa Taxidermist Creates Life-Changing Piece

A coffee table created by a Catoosa taxidermist is making a big splash. The work of art is bringing in business from all over the world.

The table is Vance Montgomery’s most recent work of art, created for Grove angler Mark Davis who caught almost every fish locally.

“He caught this 9.5 pounder up at Grand Lake,” said Montgomery.

The frog featured is from a farm pond. The 11-pound bass chasing it out of the water is from a Florida lake.

“The bass actually is missing this frog,” Montgomery explained. “The frog is getting away.”

Vance owns Vanmar Taxidermy in Catoosa.

He's a world champion taxidermist, well-known for his fish work but known even better now after posting pictures of this latest creation to Facebook.

“In two hours it had 70,000 shares,” he stated.

And it also had has his phone ringing non-stop.

“I've actually had calls from Spain, Brazil, Alaska, Canada,” said Montgomery.

And that's just to name a few.

Already he's made deals to create ten similar pieces at $10,000 dollars each.

“It was honestly a game-changer,” he said. “I'd never, never dream what was gonna happen.”

It's one of Montgomery’s most complicated and intricate pieces. It took him a month to finish.

He air-brushed each fish by hand because they're all replicas.

“You take pictures of the fish and you take the length and the girth,” he explained. “So, you can actually turn the fish back and I actually do a reproduction of the fish that you caught.”

This means anglers can enjoy their catches from inside their home and then go out on the water and reel them again.

“The wife actually almost started crying, she was so happy with it,” said Montgomery.