Is one really better than the other. It makes sense that a tan would be better, but all the videos I have seen have said the instant preserve really doesn't have that many disadvantages over a tanned hide. For commercial mounts, would it be better to use instant preserve for faster turn around, and a lower cost? Thanks, Eric
Return to Deer Taxidermy Category Menu
this must be the most covered subject in the history of this wonderful forum. I think you will have a million or so hits if you use the search button. B S
.......Of looking for "faster" and "cheaper", instead of "BEST".
Don't lets start picking on the "Dry Preservative Method" again... because I'll stand my ground on it. I don't put down tanning- if a customer wants it, we'll do it-or have it done(pickled or leather tanned). But as a general practice in our studio it's DP All the Time. Yes, it has a faster turn around time. Depending on the time you take skinning it out, fleshing it, and your freezer room- you could take a period of time(week or two) to do fleshing on several capes/hides and preparing several forms. Then you have an assembly line sort of set-up.From taking the fleshed/cleaned hide from the freezer to thaw slowly overnite(1 evening)reccommended in a cool room, to mounting it the next morning(my husband mounts as many as 5 a day from this point), the deerheads hang on the wall to dry(with a fan circulating air-not directly on mounts- in the studio to aid in drying)4-9 days to be ready to finish. Before you ask, yes you can make your own tumbler-but if your'e going into this full time, I'd go ahead and order one from one of the fine supply houses and USE it. It's a great help in processing your hides with DP. We use cedar chips and a large cup of DP-will tumble several hides before you need to add anymore DP. My father-in-law has been a practicing member of the Taxidermy profession since 1962,and he made the decision to change over to DP in approx. 1969 and we've used it ever since. Sorry if I sound a bit gruff-I'm just nervous about taking my calculus exam in about 30 mins. It is faster than both in-house pickled hides and sent off leatherd hides. You skin,flesh, clean, freeze(if you don't mount it right then), and hang it on the wall to dry. Wait a few days and finish it then you'll hear that sound that we all love to hear... CA$CHING$... and another satisfied customer is taking his mount home & opening another spot for you to hang the next trophy to dry.-Susan
Eric,
I have been using Dry Preserve since I started doing taxidermy. I have never had a DP cape slip on me yet. I have had a tanned cape slip on me though. It realy depends on what type of Dry Preserve you use and what type of animals you use it on. Some Dry Preservitives cause the hides to shrink more than others. If the animals skin is to thick it may not dry in time befor you start losing hair. I won't mount anything larger than a deer or Wild hog with DP. I will tan anything larger. such as Elk, Moose, Caribou, etc. Hope this helps.
Michelle @ Michelle's Taxidermy
I can always tell mounts where the cape was simply treated with DP becasue after a year or two (sometimes sooner) you'll see cracking of the hide around the eyes nose and lips along with other noticable problems. I get in DP specimins for remounting every year.
Eric,
It all depends on what kind of DP you are using and what you are using it on. I've been using Dp since I started doing taxidermy and i have never had a DP cape slip on me. Some Dry Preserve (DP) causes hides to shrink more than others. I try to avoid those that make a hide shrink a lot. Also I never Dp anything larger than a Deer or Wild Hog. Some animals will not dry befor their hair could begin to slip.
Tanned hides have their advantages also. If you are short on freezer space you can pull out tanned hides and dry them. You can also freeze and re-freeze more than you can a raw hide. They have a longer working time. In my opinion they dry faster once they are mounted than a DP hide. If you send your capes off to be tanned it could cost you between $35 - $100 depending on what you are tanning. If you DP your hides you don't have to pay for tanning. Hope this helps.
Michelle @ Michelle's Taxidermy
Sorry bout the double post I didn't think my first one got posted.
Krowtann is the best in my opinion. Flesh soak for 3 days final flesh and mount. No slipping unless the cape was already bad to begin with. Havent had any cracking or excessive shrinkage. Beautiful product to work with.
factual response to this but i don't feel like it now. Let it suffice for me to say that after nearly 30 years of doing this $#@! the one common denominator that I see among people who don't like DP is they havn't used it, or havn't learned to use it correctly. Let me also say I still do some rug tanning, I still use some commercial tanneries for differnt things, and I own a magnum auto tanner so I am not just one sided here.
My white tail mounts now number in the thousands and I have been in the same small town for twenty years. If my mounts were not holding up you can bet I would be out of business. I have mounted dozens of elk with it including my own, not one single problem. Many people blow hide preservation all out of proportion. I have seen raw hides tacked to a barn wall last for decades. I have done several experiments with old ugly mounts leaving them out in the weather in some cases for years and have come to the conclusion that a Dp hide is almost indestructable. Some tanned mounts held up well and some simply by-God melted. I believe my chrome tanned stuff was the worst, just seemed to disolve. Oops I said I wasn't going to get into this. Some day I'll but all this together in an article form and just cut and paste it every time this comes up. Final answer. Use what you like it all works and has it pros and cons. But people who say Dp wont last or even those who take the other side and say tanning is bad are either repeating what they've heard or simply had a bad experience.
i have a taxidermist in my area that your post reminded me of. he has mounted probably close to 1000 deer, and largly because he inherited his fathers business. his dad had done taxidermy for 30 years before he gave it to his son, now its 20 years later. that shop has really put out a lot of mounts. they use dry preserve on all their pieces. if you measure the quality of a mount based on how many a person does....i think you are backwards. the guy i just described puts out some of the crappiest deer you could imagine.
those of you who think that you will save so much time dping instead of tanning....you still have to green flesh, just like tanning. if you do it right, you still have to detail flesh, just like tanning. all you save is the time waiting while salting, pickling. then you spend another 1 1/2 hours shaving the cape and detailing the face. after that, the mounting process is the same. you can do it just like those above that like an assembly line. spend a week tanning, you can tan as many capes in a week as you have room for. and the chemicals will cost you next to nothing when you price them out per cape.
just because a mount is still haning on a wall doesnt mean it is still in good shape.
go ahead and DP. that way all the cheap customers will come to your shop and leave me alone. that way i can get more work done.
I stand by the DP method as I've said, but there is nothing wrong or bad about using various other methods of tanning. I would encourage you to try them out-but on mounts of your own(if they turn out good, use them for displays). We use DP on everything from squirrels to the big boys(elk, moose, caribou, rams,etc.) Very seldom do we have any slippage. IF you seem to be in this situation, spray(pretty heavily) down the mount with denatured alcohol and let it dry-recheck it and if it still does it, spray it down again(not more than 2-3 times).The slippage is most likely due to the hide getting too warm for too long before it was DP'd. I ran some tests for slippage under various conditions, and this was the main instigator. We also "paint" 'Knobloch's Liqua Tan' around the (inside of the cape)nose pad, eyes, and tear ducts. If you aren't sure about a product always try to test it on some scrap you've saved for that purpose.We've never had a complaint about "cracking" with the DP, and we DO encourage our customers to let us know if they do have any problems with their mounts-it's our way of tracking customer satisfaction .- Talk atcha' later-Susan
I don't know who it was that didn't leave their name (***) but for those people who say DP makes a crapy mount " You don't know what your talking about". Seriously, I don't know if any of you have heard of Grason Roberts Taxidermy in Georgia he has won tons of awards. He does awsome work and competes in the GTA show every year. I think he even sat on the board, but I'm not sure. I can't even begin to tell you how many 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place ribbons he's won!
Michelle W @ Michelle's Taxidermy
Crap is as crap does. My 25 year old mounts do look like crap, this is why I never minded experimenting with them. But guess what, they looked like crap the day they were mounted. If someones mounts look like crap with DP, they will also look like crap tanned. You obviously have not been in this long enough to have had the experiences that some of us have had. All mounts can crack if not glued properly. I am about to do a remount of a pedestal kudu for a friend that is only five years old. This was a tanned cape and was mounted by one of the biggest studios in the southeast. If I said the name everyone would recognize them. I have not seen it yet but he said it has just busted all over. He discribed it as looking like a gators hide. Go figure, it happens. If this had been a Dp hide you would be all over the company for being cheap.
Also, I never said I measured quality by numbers of heads mounted. Quality is measured by the looks of the finished product and how long it will stay that way. But if you enjoy a challenge like I do just post a picture of one of your mounts and I'll post one of mine and lets let the people judge.
Susan, it sounds like you know what your doing, I like your responses, you seem more cool headed than me. Maybe you should handle this from now on.
i have no problem posting a picture of a piece for you to look at. just tell me where you want it and ill see if i can get one there.
and the part about lots of mounts not equaling quality wasnt really directed at you, it was more of a blanket statement. i will have to admit that one of my best taxidermy friends and an award winning taxidermist doesnt "pickle" his capes, he does green flesh them very thin and then apply liquatan. but then he also rubs borax into the cape. works for him, but i havent seen many of his older mounts either.
and maybe you are right, i may not have as much experience as you. but 10 years is a lot more than alot of the people on here. and you would be wrong to assume that i dont know what im doing, just becuase i dont leave my name. that is simply to avoid viruses.
if you would like to compare work. make a new post at the top of the forum because i probably wont check this one again since its a week old.