This article is part of my FAQs series.
For well over a decade, I have been answering anonymously submitted questions on my Tumblr blog. Over that time, I have noticed many recurring themes, concerns, and misunderstandings.
This series brings together concise, practical responses to the questions I am asked most often, based on real conversations with people at every stage of thinking about veganism.
If you’d like to see more entries in this series, you can find them here.
The Short Answer
Sometimes, but often it is ethically questionable.
If animal remains are genuinely found without harm and used responsibly, the practice may not involve direct exploitation. However, taxidermy and vulture culture often create demand that encourages killing, unethical sourcing, and environmental harm. For many vegans, this makes participation difficult to justify, even when intentions are good.
The Detail
Why This Is a Complicated Issue
Vegan ethics focuses on opposing exploitation and unnecessary harm to animals.
When animals are bred, hunted, or killed for their bodies, the ethical problem is clear. But when someone uses remains from an animal who died naturally, the situation becomes more ambiguous. No living animal was harmed directly, and no industry was necessarily funded.
So at first glance, it may seem uncomplicatedly in line with vegan ethics. In practice, however, the reality is often more complicated.
The Problem of Sourcing
One of the biggest ethical concerns is where remains actually come from. Finding a well-preserved body in the wild is rare; most carcasses decay quickly or are consumed by other animals.
As taxidermy and vulture culture grow in popularity online, there is increasing demand for “usable” specimens. This creates financial incentives. In many cases, practitioners buy from collectors or suppliers who claim animals were found naturally.
But when money is involved, there is no reliable way to ensure that:
- Animals were not killed intentionally
- Wildlife laws were respected
- Exploitation did not occur
Some suppliers almost certainly kill animals for profit. When this happens, the ethical issue becomes similar to hunting for pleasure: Animals are killed so that their bodies can be used for human interest or entertainment.
From a vegan perspective, that is exploitation.
Creating Indirect Demand
Even when someone sources remains responsibly, there is another issue: Influence. Popular influencers in this space often showcase taxidermy and bone art inspire others to imitate the practice. Even if they followed strict ethical codes to produce their work, not everyone will follow those same standards.
This can increase demand for animal remains more generally, including from unethical sources. This problem is not unique to taxidermy, it exists in many ethical markets. But when the material involved is animal bodies, the risk is more morally significant.
Vegans often consider whether their actions normalise or encourage harmful industries, even indirectly. In the vulture culture and taxidermy space, this kind of influence is subtle but morally significant.
Ecological Impact
Removing remains from natural environments also affects ecosystems. Dead animals play an important role in nature:
- Feeding scavengers
- Returning nutrients to soil
- Supporting insects and microorganisms
- Maintaining ecological balance
Even shells, bones, and feathers contribute to these systems. Research on shell collecting shows that large-scale removal can damage coastal ecosystems. The same logic applies to carcasses and bones.
There are cases where this is much less of an issue. Road kill, for example, may have minimal ecological function in many cases. Other animals cannot easily feed on a carcass that is on the road, and in many cases the presence of that carcass may cause other animals to be injured in the attempt of scavenging. But remains found in forests, fields, or beaches usually serve a purpose.
Taking them removes resources from other species. This may seem like a small thing, but when we are weighing up ethical justifications it often involves weighing our interests against those of other beings. When balancing our desire to create art with another animal’s need to eat, it becomes hard to justify.
Hobby Versus Necessity
Another important question is purpose. Most taxidermy and vulture culture is pursued as:
- Aesthetic expression
- Hobby
- Personal collection
- Artistic interest
It is rarely about survival or community need, and this matters ethically.
When harm is caused for basic survival, moral frameworks often make allowances. When harm is caused for entertainment or decoration, justification becomes much weaker. Even small harms become harder to defend when they serve no essential function.
When It May Be Ethically Defensible
Some cases are more ethically defensible than others. For example:
- An animal found as fresh roadkill
- Collected legally
- No commercial exchange involved
- Used privately
- With transparent sourcing
- Without encouraging demand
In such cases, no exploitation may be involved, and the environmental impact is likely to be minimal. Here, the issue becomes more about personal ethics than vegan ethics strictly speaking.
Some vegans may still feel uncomfortable, while ohers may see it as acceptable. Both responses are understandable, but we should be careful not to confuse personal discomfort or revulsion with an ethical objection. We can be personally uncomfortable about someone making a wall-hanging out of an animal skull, without turning that into a moral judgement that we impose on others.
A Deeper Cultural Question
Beyond harm and exploitation, there is also a broader issue. Humans often feel the urge to possess nature rather than simply observe it. We collect:
- Shells
- Feathers
- Skulls
- Bones
- Preserved bodies
Instead of appreciating living ecosystems, we turn parts of them into objects. This impulse is not necessarily malicious, and in some cultures these objects carry spiritual significance. But in many cases it can reflect a tendency to treat nature as something to be owned and displayed rather than respected.
Vegan ethics seeks to challenge this mindset; it asks whether animals exist for human use at all – even after death.
Why Many Vegans Remain Uncomfortable
For many vegans, taxidermy and vulture culture raise persistent concerns:
- Difficulty verifying ethical sourcing
- Risk of encouraging exploitation
- Environmental impact
- Objectification of animal bodies
- Normalisation of using animals as materials
Even when harm is minimal, these issues can make participation feel inconsistent with broader animal rights values. As a result, many vegans choose to avoid the practice altogether. As with most issues in animal ethics, there is nuance here, and a principled position can be found on both sides of the debate.
Suggested Reading
- Robin Wall Kimmerer – Braiding Sweetgrass. Not a vegan text by any means, but a beautiful book offering an indigenous perspective on the the ways in which humans interact with nature and animals.
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