The dead ram’s head is giving off … an unusual aroma. It’s not a smell usually associated with death, but more of a sharp, sweet, medicinal "fragrance."

It’s a familiar odor for Gordon Lau Jr., one of a handful of game taxidermists in the state. Most are found on the neighbor islands where hunting is a popular pastime.

Tanned and sinewy from his other work, which includes an occasional job as a freelance carpenter, Lau brings the ram’s head out from a cooler in his workshop at his Halawa Heights home. It was shipped to him just the day before by a Kona hunter.

The hunter is a regular client of Lau’s, who has been preparing trophy kills for display for more than 25 years. Even with the down economy, his O‘ahu Taxidermy Service has been averaging about three animals a week, charging $150 and up for game birds and about $400 for shoulder mounts of wild boar and deer.

"The last five years, in particular, have been unreal," he said. "That’s because I’m the only one on this island."

Lau used to work with longtime taxidermist George Lee, who is now retired.

"He was one of the first to use actual skin," said Lau, referring to the tanned hides taxidermists place over specially ordered mannequins to re-create game animals.

"George was like the Yoda of local taxidermy. He did everything, animals as well as fish. His shop was like a museum. He’s probably worked with every fish to swim in the Hawaiian Islands."

Now back to the ram’s head. It’s been defrosting for an hour, and Lau is prepping the skull, bending over the remnant carcass while methodically working a scalpel to slice the wooly pelt from an area between the animal’s eyes and horns.

He’ll keep the jaw and teeth, along with the crown to which the horns are attached, disposing of the rest of the skull and the flesh still attached to the remains.

"The ram was killed with a gun, and it looks like it’s 4, 5 years old," Lau said. "The guy did a good job caping the ram, or taking off the skin, soon after the kill and right at the place where the ram was dropped."

Once the hide is removed and dried over the course of about a week, it will be fitted on a specially ordered foam mannequin in a process that takes an average of nine hours. Lau finishes off his work with airbrushing to restore real-life color to the animals, taking care around the snout and artificial eyes.

His clients include sheep and deer hunters on Lanai, Oahu pig hunters and even hunters who have bagged game on safari in Africa.

With axis deer hunting season just under way, Lau is expecting a boost in business. While he prefers working with freshly killed game, he’s done carcasses that have been frozen for upward of nine years.

"That’s tough, because sometimes I have to deal with freezer burn," he said.

He learned his trade from his grandfather K.S. Lau, whose 1925 diploma hangs in an outdoor trophy room next to the younger Lau’s covered garage. Like his grandfather, he honed his skills by taking a mail-order course from the Northwestern School of Taxidermy.

"I started as a teenager, just out of high school, and did my fair share of hunting," Lau said.

He still hunts when he can, taking his dogs along to stalk game birds and using a bow to take down sheep on Hawaii island and sometimes in Wai­anae.

"Looking at the work I’ve done, I think my grandfather would be pretty proud of me. He was a good taxidermist himself, as well as a good hunter. He used to work for Hawaiian Telephone, and with nine mouths to feed, he had to go out to hunt and fish for food. And what he did was definitely old-school. He would use the original skull and make a mold out of shredded wood for the body."

He added, "The only license I need is when I do federal and state work for educational purposes on migratory birds, like seagulls."

Lau said he would like to do the taxidermy on a full-time basis and would consider taking on jobs from pet owners wishing to preserve their beloved animal companions — a trend gaining notoriety from reality TV shows such as Animal Planet’s "American Stuffers." In most cases the pets are freeze-dried in perpetuity.

"I generally don’t do pets," he said, "but I’m definitely getting more requests from pet owners. I now get a couple of calls a week from them, whether it’s a dog, cat or something like a canary. I currently don’t have a freeze-dryer, which would take all of the moisture out of the animal. After that, so long as it doesn’t get rained on, the pet can last for a lifetime."

He continued: "I’ve actually seen a preserved pet, although at the time I didn’t know. While I was out on a carpentry job, I went into the homeowner’s bedroom, and I saw a large German shepherd lying on the carpet at the foot of the bed, so I tried to be quiet.

"The homeowner saw me and asked me why I was being so careful around the dog because it was dead! So I looked at it closer and, sure enough, it was, but it looked like it was still alive. What the owner had done was to first position the dog and then put it in the freeze-dryer.

"I haven’t done pets because I don’t think I could reproduce what the owner saw in the pet while it was alive. I mean, I would be only with the animal for a short time, and the owner has the memories of living with the pet. Besides, thinking that I would have to dig out a dead dog’s eyes, that’s just …," Lau said, shuddering at the thought.