But, over there, Bob Skuse said, motioning to a collection of taxidermied sheep taken in Alberta, the Yukon, and British Columbia, those are “the toughest thing in the world to hunt … You climb (6,000) to 10,000 feet every day. That’s by far the toughest thing.”

Over there, a wall of ducks. On the other side, a warthog, an antelope, a Cape grysbok. On the other side of the big stone accent wall, a timber wolf, a mountain lion, several deer. On the floor, a zebra hide lays below a massive elephant tusk on the mantle, which rests below an elephant ear painted up by a local artist.

Leaping out of one corner, the centerpiece: an African lion, taken in the northern parts of South Africa after an 11-day hunt.

In all, some 35 years of adventure hang on the walls of the back room at Bob’s Gun Shop, dozens of trophies taken by Skuse over decades of hunting across America and Africa and Canada.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A painted elephant ear and an elephant tusk take the centerpiece spot on a stone accent wall recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

Plus one fish taken by Skuse’s son in Cancun.

The lion — a fully grown, growling beast with claws extended toward passersby — may capture the eye, but the Cape buffalo — the black death — stands out to Skuse as a particularly formidable foe.

Check out the video below of an interview with Bob Skuse. Viewing on mobile? Turn your device horizontally for the best viewing experience. Story continues below video.

“I shot that. It didn’t drop,” Skuse recalled during a recent interview. “You can’t shoot it in the head. They’ve got so much bone, it’ll bounce off. So, we waited a half-hour, then we hunted it up to see if it was hunting us. It wasn’t, so I finished it off.”

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley The bust of a Cape buffalo, known by locals in South Africa as “black death,” hangs recently on the stone wall in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

Not that the lion came down without danger.

“You’d hunt for awhile, go to sleep, get up early and go hunting, then you’d take another rest and hunt at night, too,” Skuse said. “You try to get it before it knows you’re there, tracking you, you know. You always have to have the wind in your favor.”

Skuse, 83, has hunted since age 12, growing up poor near Lincoln.

“We was the last place that had electricity,” Skuse said. “When I was about 12, I started hunting, .22, you know, stuff like that. That’s when it started.”

Skuse has owned Bob’s Gun Shop for 59 years, building up the trophy collection that now lines almost every corner of every wall in that back room, plus several deer mounted in the main showroom of the gun shop just outside of Alpena on M-32.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A Safari Club International Silver Award Bob Skuse earned in 1988 for taking a Cape eland in Namibia sits recently on the mantle in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

His first trip to Africa happened in 1983, when a missionary he helped support invited him to hunt.

“I went over to Zimbabwe and I hunted with him,” Skuse said. “I shot, I think, about 10 animals. The next year, I went back again, I went to a different country, and I shot 10, 12 animals. I went back four times all together, and I went to five countries.”

And, each trip, he brought something back for his wall: kudus, waterbucks, jackals.

“I was hunting for different animals,” he said. “I didn’t want to shoot anything two of one.”

In his adventures, Skuse has won several awards for taking top game. He’s also won trophies for marksmanship. In 2016, the Alpena Sports Hall of Fame inducted him for his hunting.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A stuffed black bear sits recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

“You just gotta make your mind up you’re gonna do it,” Skuse said. “It’s not something you just walk in and get. You really gotta hunt for them.”

Skuse doesn’t hunt anymore — “I’m over the hill,” he said — and no one can hunt today the way he hunted.

“There’s a lot more restrictions,” he said. “Like, I don’t think you can bring lion back anymore. There’s a few of them you can’t bring back anymore.”

So, as he looks happily around his trophy room, the memories roaring at him like his lion in the corner, Skuse can only smile, and nod, and say, “I’ve been blessed. The good Lord was with me.”

Justin A. Hinkley can be reached at 989-354-3112 or jhinkley@thealpenanews.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinHinkley.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A collection of waterfowl hangs recently on the wall in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A collection of African animals shot by Bob Skuse are seen recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley An African lion shot by Bob Skuse is seen mounted recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley An African lion shot by Bob Skuse after an 11-day hunt is seen recently as the centerpiece of the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A collection of antlered animals hang on the wall recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A mountain lion is seen mounted recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A stuffed timber wolf is seen recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A zebra hide covers the floor in front of a stone accent wall recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley Taxidermied waterfowl rest recently in the trophy room at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.

News Photo by Justin A. Hinkley A warthog is seen mounted on the wall recently at Bob’s Gun Shop near Alpena.