People make mistakes. But, most small business owners are terrible business people. I’m not going to accuse him of something that he may not have done. But, this seems pretty weird to me.
How many ducks does this guy do? I’ve seen A lot of mounts but few are ducks. It seems easy enough to me for him to track it down. His unwillingness to do so smells funny.
It shouldn’t be that hard. If it’s a business he surely has documentation of who he’s mounted ducks for. It would suck to have to get it back but, it was his mistake and something any decent person would do if guilty of giving it to someone else.
To me it only makes sense that he threw it out by mistakes or capitalized on how rare it was. It makes zero sense he can’t find it if he mistakenly gave it to someone else wanting a similar animal mounted.
I hate this for you But, I personally believe he said oh well. He might feel bad about it if it were a true mistake. But, he could fix it if he wanted to if that were the case.
That’s my take on it. How you handle it is up to you. But, there’s little doubt what kind of person he is regardless of what happened. And, regardless of his reputation.
And, there is zero chance I’d let this guy do anything for me. And, now he’s made his decision, I’d return the favor and try to make him feel it in his pocket. Fair is fair. And, if he thinks so little of you or lacks enough decent in him to do the right thing, he deserves future customers know the way he handles mistakes or, rare mounts he stands to profit from more so then simply doing the work to preserve them.
