Florida Outdoors Hunting & Fishing Forums - FOHAF.COM

Well the buck i harvested last year is what im working on. I had it sitting on the ground for a month then hung up in a tree for a month.. then soaked it in water to soften the skin and finally got it all skinned out. But theres some thin skin still on it.. what do i got to do to finalize this whats the nest steps.? I put it in a bucket of water again but whats the nest steps to curing it fully? thanks.

You have to get every piece of meat off of it. Use an old knife and scrape and soak again. There is some meat at the base of the skull where the spine goes in that is very stubborn. Mix up a bucket of water, a scoop of baking soda, dish soap and a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. That will turn it naturally white. Not bleached white, but white like natural bone. No need whatsoever to use all that expensive crap some people use. It may lighten up the antlers but thats ok. Just use wood stain in a very light tone and they will look good as new. The nose bones and teeth will need a touch of superglue to hold in

thanks im soaking it in water again.. ima scrape it tomorrow when i get back from the lease then do this mixture and let it sit. how long do i gotta let it sit in the mixture?

At least a week. You have to get the smell out. You'll need to change the water/mixture every 3-4 days. A skull is not white because it has fat, oils and grease in it. That concoction will pull all that out of the bone. The longer it stays in the better.
Once its done you need to put it in the brightest sun you can find for 2 days

why not do it the easy way?
cut as much fur and meat off as possible then simmer in a pot of water with a few drops of dawn(with bleach alternitive) for an hour or two, Take out and scrape with a knife just dont scratch or nick the bone. Put back in SIMMERING water NOT boiling for an hour or two. By now the skull should be about clean if not use a wire brush or continue scraping. Then place the skull in a bin or rubber tote with HOT water with a few more drops of dawn, and my secret is to add some GOJO grease cleaner you use on your hands. Then get an air hose with a chuck that blows air like you would use to blow stuff off. Put the skull under the hot water and with the chuck stick it into diffrent cavitys on the skull and blow the water and air into them like your boiling it but with air. Be careful of the nasal bones!!! do this few times and change the water then do it a few more! next air dry the skull then coat with cream 40% peroxide and wrap with seran wrap place in sun or next to heat as the beauty shop stuff is heat activeated. keep wrapped for an hour or two wash off then let dry if not white enough coat and wrapp again but the first wrapp will do the trick. All done in a few hours worth of work.

looks great!

everyone has their own way of doing it. The way I do it works for me, and is maintenence free. Just stick it in a bucket and forget about it. I boiled a skull one time and swore I never would do it again

i still got in out i a bucket of water.. gotta get on scrapping it tomorrow.. then ill take it from there! thanks for the info!

After reading this I just went out and drained the water off of my two racks,I almost got sick it stunk so bad. I did the same thing as Carlos. I skinned mine out best I could,tied them to the base of a tree and let the bugs work on them then about 3 weeks ago put them in a bucket of water.They are about 95% finished,I just hit them with a high pressure hose and put them in a clean bucket of water. Tommorow a bottle of peroxide will get dumped in with them and hopefully in another week,presto.They will no longer stink.

i have it all scraped clean.. theres tiny little pieces of meat i mean like a spec os sand in some places.. its been in the mixture for a week.. ima take it out tomorrow and let it sit in the sun..

Just took mine out and got it in the sun. Some teeth fell out of the top half but i got them all and will superglue them in.. Also got the bottom half of the jaw also!.. Its all drying. Its just a spike so im not gonna put up a pic and embarrass myself Even though i don't hunt deer just hogs.. lol

Good thing is it looks like natural bone not a bleached look.. Well see how it looks when its all dried out. The back of the skull where the spine attaches has some tough under skin that i will have to dremel off but otherwise its looking good.! Hey its my first deer so i wanted something to remember it by. Actually my first deer was a doe that i found later with a bear eating it so i never got that one. But its going! hopefully this coming season on the new lease ill get something mountable.

I'm new to this but I started on my hog head yesterday. Threw it in a large pot and boiled for a few hours. Most of the meat and all of the hide fell right off. Some teeth did come out and of course the jaws separated, no big deal. Next, I put the skull into a small crab trap I had and laid it on top of an ant pile. I check it a few hours later and it was completely covered with ants. This morning I checked again and it's about 80% clean of all meat and cartilage and still covered in ants. I'd suspect that it will be pretty well clean by tonight when I check it again. So far it's been a very easy process. Next I plan to soak it in some water/peroxide solution to lighten it up.


After boiling






Going into crab trap





After 8 hrs on the ant pile

I did a lot of reading on the taxidermy.net forum earlier on how to do the euro process. I, personally, prefer the maceration process of putting it in a tub of water and forgetting about it.

The biggest key to this is to keep the water around 90* during the maceration process. A few days of this should have most everything off the bone. Be forewarned - this will stink and nearly make you gag! Change the water periodically but KEEP a small portion of the water/bacteria that has grown.

Once ALL meat is off the bone you can move to the degrease portion. The lazy man's way (my preferred method ) is to put it in a tub with some dawn. If you can get it up to 125* it will speed the process up. Simply keep the water changed when it starts to turn murky. When you think you've got all of the oil/grease out of the skull let it dry out and you'll be able to tell any spots that need additional work.

The air compressor trick works good too. Here's a detailed 5 hour process detailed - http://www.taxidermy.net/forum/index.ph ... 076.0.html

The hog head is going to take additional time to soak all the grease out of it.

I've done this a couple times on hogs and deer skulls. I really learned a lesson...it's worth it to ship it to a guy with a beetle farm. Good luck!