Ok guys, here’s how everything went down. I got notification from the warehouse (land air express) at DFW that they had received the shipment from Turkish Air. I filed all my paperwork with USFWS electronically, so I called them and let them know they were at the warehouse for inspection. FWS agent said it would likely be 2-3 days before they were ready for inspection, said I would get an email when FWS had inspected and cleared the trophies..... approximately 37 minutes later I got the email with the paperwork stamped cleared. So now it was off to Customs. All they required was the invoice and packing list sent from the taxidermist and the clearance document from FWS. The agent filled out the customs form for us and stamped it for clearance. Off to the warehouse, where we paid $55 (cash or money order, exact change only) for their holding the shipment. Gave her the clearance from Customs and FWS she took the money gave me all the documentation from the shipment and directed me to the rear of the warehouse where a forklift loaded the boxes in the back of my truck. Everything went pretty smooth, only hiccup was at the warehouse the lady noticed Customs had put the pickup location as Turkish air and said we’d have to have it changed, luckily another employee overheard and said it was fine.
On a sad note my father-in-law had 4 trophies in his box, impala, gemsbok, wildebeest, and blesbok, and three of the four were damaged. Impala was the worst followed by the gemsbok and wildebeest. His blesbok was fine. All were euro’s. I had 7 euros and a rug and the only damage I had was to my gemsbok and I fixed it pretty easy with some supper glue. Needless to say he’s on the way to his taxidermist as I type.
