I am interested in taxidermy and doing a little research on it. Have found a LOT of helpful info on this site. Could someone please briefly describe what is meant by "turning ears" and "splitting lips"? I gather the ear thing is like tuning them inside out? Any help will be appreciated, thanks in advance.
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Splitting the lips.............pinch your bottom lip with your thumb and forefinger. That "squishy" stuff is meat. Splitting the lips means cutting the lips in such a way that you can remove that meat...leaving you with a flap of skin. That skin is trimmed and insterted into the form to help hold its shape.
You have to do similar with the nose and eyes.
The ears have cartilage in them. You have to use a special tool to open the ear up from the inside. Care must be taken though not to blow threw the ear. These holes can be fixed and are fairly common if you are not careful. Once the ears are opened up, you can remove the cartilage. The ear is then basically for an insert once it is time to mount.
OK, that helps a good bit. On the lips, you would cut on the inside surface and roll it outward? Like cutting where you would put skoal?
....but you have to continue on all the way around the mouth. Then move on to the nose by removing the cartilage and "splitting" the nostrils.
Then come the eyes. You have to roll the upper and lower eyelids the same way you do the mouth. Be careful around the tear duct.
Make your lip splitting job a whole lot easier and buy #22 scalpels (along with the correct handle of course). I usually go through 4 or 5 per deer. (Although, I do make them last a bit longer than I should). I've only mounted 7 deer so far, but this is the advice I found in the archives last year when I was getting started and it has made a world of difference.
I turn the ears (take the cartilage out with my fingers, a pair of needlenose pliers, and a scalpel. Needlenose work similarly as the ear openers various supply companies offer. The scalpel is used to cut through very gently the small handful of fibers you'll find running along the cartilage when you open them up. Most of the work is done with fingers. I believe it is McKenzie's catalog that has illustrations of how to remove the cartilage after the ear has been turned inside out completely on one side all the way to the end. Feel free to ask if you have any more questions.
Thanks a lot for the answers so far. I've requested a few catalogs and have only received the Van Dyke's one so far. Ordered a few videos just to see what it's all about. They should be here tomorrow or tues. Any recommendations on a good book or particular video? All that I seem to find focus on a particular subject, looking for a broad overview.
the only thing i will add to this is the ear cartilage is a heck of alot easier to remove with out damage after the cape is tanned. open the ears and rough flesh the butts, then tan,then open the rest of the way and peel cartilage out with your fingernails. works great and the ear is ALOT tougher once tanned.
Try using the orange search button, I wrote this up several times already here and I am sure others have as well. You will learn lots for your time, good luck.