My Rabbit fur smells. Can you help

Hi There,

I hope someone here can shed some light on my problem.

I bought some rabbit fur rugs from Korea during Chrsitmas. They were really cheap (about $10 for a 3 x 2 feet). Maybe that's not cheap to you people, but I live in London, England, where everything is a rip off.

Anyway, the 'rugs' look and feel fine, but they do smell a bit of dead animal, not surprising.

This weekend (Ok I will hurry up but I thought you'd get a kick out of this part) I visited Spitalfield market where some French bloke was flogging Rabbit Fur Rug, about 7' x 7 1/2' for 699pounds, over a $1,000! I asked him how to take care of the furs and he said if I buy one he will tell me what chmicals I can buy to clean it myself.

So, I am wondering if there is a less expensive way of geting the smell out of the rabbit fur. I see some products for sale on taxidermy.com buy don't know if they will do (or if they are available in the UK). Any help would be truly appreciated.

Thanks,

John

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My beaver smells. Can you help?

I know I'm bad, but I just couldn't resist.

More than likely its the Oil they used!

John - more than likely it's the tanning oil they used. It's probably a Fish Oil base and now that it's oxidized - obviously it smells! The Korean Tanners are known to use a lot of Fish Oils in their tanning processes.

Getting the smell out though can be difficult. Do this outside away from any ignition sources. Take a plastic garbage bag - put in 5-6 Lbs. of sawdust, preferably hardwood - add about 8-12 fl. ozs. of Lacquer Thinner, tie it off - bounce it around for 1-2 minutes - then open it and place the skin in it! Again bounce it for around 5-8 minutes - then open the bag - remove the rug - and blow and beat it out. This essentiially is "dry cleaning" it. It will remove the outer layer of obnoxious oil but a small hint of it may linger. At least this is a safe way to reduce it.

MARY

I wooden touch dat wit a...OH! Never mind. Butt...eye kin help wit yer problim...hah.

Many Thanks

Firstly, thanks for the replies, both witty and informative.

I'll pop down to the shops at the weekend to see if I can get my hands on some Lacquer Thinner. I hope I can find that stuff, if I can I will give it a go and post the results here.

Thanks again,

John

Laquer Thinner in the UK

is called mineral spirits I think.

Maybe so but they are not the same thing

Lacquer thinner is a much more powerful solvent than mineral spirits (paint thinner).