I have just skinned my first bobcat. The video I have goes through everything but tanning. I have looked in the archives and not really found the answer to my questions. In my video they skin the cat and then pour salt all over, fold and put in a bag in the fridge overnight. This is where I am at right now. The video continues with the cat already tanned and redy for mounting. I do not know what to do next. I took it out of the bag tonight and cut most all the remaining flesh and fat then I re-salted and put back in the fridge. I now need to order the form but this will take at least a week for it to get to me. What do I do with the hide while I wait for the form to get here. I will also need to know what is the bast way to tan this cat. I have seen several bits of info in the archives about dry salting the skin and then rehydrating it. How is this done? To top it off, this is a cat that measured 34" long. None of my catalogs offer a cat in this length. Do I order one that is shorter? I have three other bobcats that are my own so I am not to worried if I have already messed this one up, but I would like to mount this one cause it is so big. Please let me know what to do with the hide so it will be okay to use once my tanning chemicals and form arrive. Tommorrow will be the third day it has been in the fridge with salt on it. Oh, I almost forgot, the video never said when to wash the skin. Can I still wash it after it has been salted in the fridge?
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Take the cat out of the fridge please. Make yourself a incline of some sort nothing that is real steep but something that is a bit over 5* would be fine. I use those light grids you can get at any lumber company. They have 1/2" slots and work real good for the draing process.
Unroll the cat and place him on this flat. Let the cat drain of the fluids from the salting. If you read the archives you will what to so next.
salt for 24hrs, shake off and resalt, let dry hard.
Rehydrate in water and I like to use Rittel's ultra-soft.
Take out, rinse and then pickle for three days making sure you stir the pickle bath twice a day. Once in the morning and after work would be fine.
Take out drain for thrity minutes finish off all fleshing and shave the hide the best you can. Make sure you clean inbetween all the hair roots on those cats. The wiskers will lay better and make a nicer looking cat. Degrease the cat, rinse of well and repickle for another 24 hrs.
Neturlize in water with baking soda added. One tablespoon of baking soda to each gallon of water. Saok for no more than twenty minutes. Rinse well and now your ready for your tan. My two favorites tans are either Liqua-Tan from Knobloch's (rub on tan)or EZ-100 (you soak it)from Rittels. You can't make a mistake with either one, simple but great tans. More info can be found on there web site. Just click on there names and either ask Mark or Bruce.
Now you need to get a form that is close to what you need. After that you need to alter the form. If you go to this site, http://www.TaxidermyReference.com , you will find info on how to alter forms. It's not a hard process to do. I find it fun to alter forms. The main thing is to know where the bones are and you can alter any form. Just draw them out and cut and make the form to your needs.
Now will your hide be fine? That no one can really say since we never seen it or really know how it was takin care of after the time of death. Just do your best and see how it goes.
The only difference that I do is NEVER allow a hide to dry hard. I've never seen the purpose of that except "we always did it that way". Traditionally, we allowed hides to dry hard so that we could get a lot of them together and tan all at once. In the current methods of shop tanning, once a hide stops dripping water, why not put it directly into the pickle while it's pliable? Even stuff I send to the tannery, many times, I just wait until there's no puddling and send it out while it folds up neatly to fit the box.
I don't know WHO would recommend putting a salted hide in a plastic bag in the fridge. Are you sure you have that right? If so, toss that tape.
Thomas,
Since you need to order tanning supplies i'm assuming you haven't pickled or tanned in the past. If this is the case you will also need to order pickling acid, (citric, saf-tee, leatherizing, oxalic or whatever. The pickle is a mixture of water, salt and acid. You can get the pickle recipe from the archives or from the taxidermy supply house. If you have the acid on hand or if you can get some from a local taxidermist, you can proceed with pickling the skin as mentioned above. If not, let the skin continue to dry until your supplies come in. After the second salting and 24 hours of drying you may want to shake off any excess salt and loosely fold or roll up the skin so it will fit into your rehydration container, but Do Not rehydrate until your supplies come in and you are ready to pickle.
Thank you all very much. I have let the skin set out to dry with salt on it. I will use the method described above.