Hardwood chips

I was told that hardwood chips works real good for tumbling bird skins. Can anyone tell me where I can buy some, or if you have a number I can call to order some. Thanks

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Who Told You That?

Hardwood SAWDUST works. You might be able to buy hardwood sawdust from a meat processor that does their own smoking. It comes in 50 lb. bags in various sizes, from sand like to 1/8" "chips". I have seen bags of "chips" that were actually chips, like made with an ax. That will not work, but if, "someone told you" maybe you should try them. There are valuable lessons to be learned from what "someone tells you"!

Try Van Dyke's

I just get mine from Van Dykes supply.They have corn cob grit and fine hardwood sawdust.I use both with a 60/40 mix.Bird skins and capes,small mammal hides come out nice and fluffy and very shiny.

check out your local hardwood sawmill if you have any

I live in an area with alot of sawmills so I just stopped in to the yard office of one and asked if I could buy a bag of their sawdust for tanning hides. He let me have a bag and didn't even charge me. Just make sure the sawdust is from hardwood and not softwood or it could get messy from the pitch (you know, the sticky stuff from pine and hemlocks)

If your going to use wood dust

get it from a taxidermy supply company like Ryan said (the other Ryan). White feathers can stain real easy if you use dust from certain trees. I use only corn cob because early in my career I screwed up a snow goose and stained it yellow because of the dust I used.

Corn cob grit

here also. I would think that the sawdust from the mill would be dirty?