Buying a Tail- Warning Signs
This post was made to help those who are new to gear/tails/vulture culture and would like to know more. This post focuses solely on real fur tails.
Note: In this post my main focus is on the shady individual sellers like those on Etsy, Instagram, and some Aminos.
These are phrases and things you need to keep an eye out for when purchasing a tail to ensure you aren't being played by some shady seller.
"I get my tails from taxidermists"
There are several things wrong with this statement.
1. Professional taxidermists do not sell or give away tails. You CANNOT buy tails from any taxidermy studio because the taxidermist does not own that hide, they are simply mounting it for the customer.
2. Taxidermists do not tan or order bulk hides, all their hides are brought to them by their customers in small quantities.
If the seller is bad at wording and means at-home taxidermists (people who work on their own stuff like personal mounts) that's a different story, but even then a small scale taxidermist is NOT capable of producing hundreds of tails that these sellers have, so more than likely the seller is trying to play on your ignorance.
Saying "I get my tails from a taxidermist" sounds a lot nicer and more wholesome than saying "I get my tails wholesale from a garment company that buys from fur lots or has a direct supplier" The seller is trying to get you to buy their tails by making you think "Oh it's from a little taxidermy studio! Im not supporting the fur industry!" Don't fall for this crap.
"All my tails come from roadkill"
Now there is nothing wrong with this statement, as many sellers do work strictly from roadkill, but if you see morphs in there shop that do not appear in the wild, or mass quantities of tails, that seller is bullshitting you. As someone who works on roadkill regularly, you will only get a few foxes and coyotes each year, not hundreds of tails. If someone only has two or three tails in their shop, there's a good chance they are working from just roadkill. But if they have dozens of tails, then they are buying the tails in mass quantities and reselling them.
Keep and eye on the species of tails too. If someone is selling arctic fox tails, and the seller lives in Arizona, then you know for sure that isn't roadkill because that species of fox doesn't live anywhere near Arizona.
Color morphs are something to keep an eye on as well. Varieties like platinum, golden island, cinnamon, marble, and blue fox are all ranched colors. These coat patterns do NOT appear in the wild, and therefore wouldn't be harvestable as roadkill. Meaning the seller is buying them from somewhere that collects from furfarms and not picking them off the road.
"I save these tails from being burned/thrown away/discarded by garment companies"
No, just...no. Companies are smart, they do not throw away useable product. I worked at a beef slaughterhouse for about a year and literally every part of the cow was saved and resold, even the stomach contents. NOTHING was thrown away. It's the same with a fur company. Paws, faces, tails, and even trim are packaged and resold to other sellers. Small sellers, like some on Etsy, buy these tails for cheap, around $5 a tail for most places, add fancy clasps and rings, and sell them for $20 to $30.
You👏🏻are👏🏻not👏🏻"saving"👏🏻a👏🏻tail.
You are just buying something that would have been sold anyways. These sellers are playing on your ignorance of how garment companies sell their waste, they aren't "rescuing these tails from a life in the dump to give them new homes" they are PLAYING you.
"Is it bad to own or buy a tail?"
No. As long as that tail is from an ethical source then there's nothing wrong in my opinion.
"Why do sellers use these shady tactics and lies?"
Because they want more business, sellers who lie about stuff like this are trying to get you, the sweet little bean who is trying to buy an ethically sourced tail, to buy from them even though they get their shit from shady sources.
If someone has to lie about where their product comes from, then they know someone is gonna have an issue with how their product is produced. So by saying something like "It's all roadkill" it makes someone more inclined to buy if they don't like fur farms, and if that buyer doesn't know any better, they may just buy the exact opposite of what they want.
"Am I stupid for believing these shady sellers?"
Not at all! It's their fault for trying to play you for a fool, next time just do a little more research into the fur industry before buying.
"Why did you make this post?"
Because I am sick and tired of new and aspiring tail collectors being scammed. Most people want to make sure that their animal products, like tails, are coming from an ethical and humane source. Some people consider highly regulated fur farms to be humane, others consider only naturally killed animals to be humane, either way, you're going to try and buy a tail that's from a source you consider humane. You're probably even willing to spend extra to ensure what you're buying sits with your moral code. I don't want to see kids pay $40 for a fox ass because someone told them it was gonna be thrown away or it had naturally died, when really that seller got the tail for $5 from a fur farm.
This post is to show those who are new to all this how the tail trade works, and inform them of the real practices so they aren't wasting their money on lies.
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