I had a fox and a coyote rehydrating in seperate tubs and when I took them out the hair was falling out of there faces and ears. My rehydrating bath was cool water, borax, and lysol. The skins were pretty dry but not stiff. They were in the bath for about 12 hours. I skined the animals, fleshed, opened the eyes ears and lips, feet. salted for 48 hours. What did I do wrong? Thanks for any reply
ron
Return to Beginners Category Menu
AND THE BORAX AND THE LYSOL
I would bet a dollar to a dime your water bath pH was way over 9.0 pH
BORAX is alkaline, I know the pH of LYSOL is over nine.
Lysol nolonger has carbolic acid in it, thats a huge problem!
Next time you rehydrate a fox or coyote, do so in a 4.0 pH bath.
Myself I just put the salted hide into my acid pickle and never have that problem.
I also didnt read into your post that despite fleshing and salting - you didnt allow them to tighten up by drying them completely. Or did you? Even so, that relaxing bath is about as close as you can come to dehairing. Borax would at least put it up to around a 8.0-8.5 PH and the Lysol is about a 9.5 PH - so John is right - its entirely too high a PH for relaxing skins - even if they were handled properly. You definitely have to find another way to relax - use a Salt Brine or a Commercial Relaxer - but stay away from Borax and Lysol.