I just took in my first velvet buck to my taxidermy shop this morning. It was shot last night and is a beautiful 135 class 4x4. My question is what is the best way to preserve the velvet? I've heard of preserving the velvet by injecting it with formeldehide? How is that done and it is effective? I also know that you can freeze dry the antlers. How does that work? Which way is better? I just threw the cape and rack in the freezer and left it for now. The velvet seems to be a touch loose so I never even wanted to attempt caping it yet. I thought that I could just freeze it until I could get some advice from the pros. Thanks for any help.
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I read in the Reasearch Mannikin catalog that you can send the rack to them and they'll preserve it.I don't know if your interested in that though.
Chip
Hi,
We can freeze-dry the rack for you if you would like , we have done Freeze-drying since 1980. Please e-mail us if you are interested for details
.
gc@uslink.net
I will however say you should skin him out right now as if he freezes up solid you will have to wait longer for him to thaw and that is not good for
the velvet . Skin him out and then get the rack and skin back in the freezer. Just my thoughts.
In my humble opinion, both methods have their times and places. Antlers that have soft, jellied, tips should be freezedried without question. Some people can't afford this method and have to rely on an alternative. If your customer is one of these OR if the tips have already harden and may even protrude the velvet, freeze drying does very little good. The velvet is within hours of being shed anyway. I use a barrel of 50/50 formaldehyde/water (I've even used 20/80 as the formaldehyde can be intense in a confined shop when the lid is removed from the barrel). Once caped out, I set the antlers in the barrel for several weeks. I then remove them and hang them to dry. If the velvet can be injected , this is an alternate method to the submersion. Inject them as much as you can and hang them up to dry. A hole punched in the tips may allow old blood to ooze out or be forced out by the injections. Each day for the next 2 or 3 weeks, I mist the antlers with Touchstone's 4in1 or Rittel's PreservzIt. These are less noxious and supposedly safer. When the velvet is dried completely (the spray evaporates quickly anyway), I segregate them from my other antlers to prevent
When deer antlers are this late in velvet, the antler os usually fully formed and respondes well to Rittels Preserv-it. I use it as a submersion or bath, and the antlers do look great. I personally wouldnt rely on spraying them only. Injecting isnt as easy as it sounds, because certain areas already have dried and wont allow the mixture to circulate to all areas. Thus the bath! Injecting DOES help by forcing blood OUT of the antlers, provided they back flush out the burrs or that you perforate the tips for added drainage. I also drill thru the skull up into the antler core as well. I wouldnt use formalin again now that Preserv-it is available...
As for injecting antler velvet....Be prepared for leaks. Small tears or scars may spray whatever chemical you may be injecting in an unpredictable direction--like your eyes. Never inject any preservative without good eye protection. This is standard for bird feet or anything else as well of course. Probably everyone knows this but it bears mentioning anyway. Enjoy, Aaron H.