I have had no experience in preserving feather and wings, I mostly have dealt only with skinning of furred mammals. I recently acquired chickens on my farm, and one small hen (about 4 pounds) was picked off by some bird of pray. The only parts left undamaged were the wings, so I figured instead of wasting them I would try and taxiderm them. I cleaned them up best I could, pinned them and left them in silicia gel for a month to dry. The wing stayed in the position I had put it in, was ridged, and had no odor whatsoever. The only problem was that the feathers were very greasy, I don't know how I would go about cleaning them because I hadn't removed any of the muscle from the wing, and I'm worried that If I use some sort of solution with water it will cause the wing to rot.
I would be thankful for any ideas, suggestions, and answers to help me in the future.
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Maybe take a rag with water and Dawn soap, and lightly wipe the feathers until the grease is gone, trying not to get it too wet. Give it a final wipe with clean water to get all the soap off. Next, blow dry the wing with a regular hair drier until it is completely dry. Most bird taxidermists wash the greasiest of birds with Dawn dish soap, and I personally blow dry my birds with a hair drier, set on cool. Well, good luck, and please let us know if you got them clean!
Kurt, I work for a poultry company in Ark. and have mounted a few hens and roosters from the flocks that I supervise. Bird skins are very greasy. I remove all the meat that I can from the wings by pulling the wing out of the skin as if you were turning it inside out. When you get to the tips, it's pretty tough to do. On the skin, I get a butter knife (with the rough edges on the end) and with some light force scrape against the greasy hide. Then wash in dawn dish washing soap. I usually wash it again in super solv degreaser. Then I'll soak it some Liqua Cure overnight. I haven't tryed the white gas tecnique yet, I'm planning on trying that on my blue-winged teal next Sat. Hope I helped.
If you haven't removed any of the meat out of the wings they WILL bleed grease and be prone to bug infestation as well as making a good chew toy for the dog.
No matter how much cleaning you do to the feathers, they will still eventually rot.
the wings should have been turned, or split and all the meat and tendons removed, then the skin washed and preserved, and THEN pinned to dry.
Jon