I haven't mounted many deer (maybe 20), but on each of them I notice that when I get my capes back from the tannery they don't have near as much hair in the inner ear as they did when I originaly fleshed them, maybe only half as much at most. Is this common? Are the ears just naturally going to lose some hair?
I have used two different tanneries, and the results are the same, so if this is not normal than it must be something that I am doing. I flesh the deer as soon as I get them and then salt them down really well to be dryed before sending them to the tannery. Am I missing something?
Thanks for any responses.
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Brian, Here's what I think. First, everytime you skin a critter and tan it some hair falls out-everytime. The hair inside the ears is thinnest and therefor most noticable. The fact that it is only showing up inside the ears and not on the backs of the ears seems to indicate it is not a problem with you UNLESS you are stressing the hair with your fingers when you are turning the ears. Heat from your fingers could be a slight factor but my feeling is that it has more to do with dry tanning than anything else. You salt dry the skin, it gets rehydrated, tanned and dried again, then rehydrated to mount. Drying and rehydrating stresses that epidermis and can cause a few lost hairs. Hair loss inside the ears is less with proper in shop tanning, I think. Just my opinion, enjoy, Aaron H.
Filling the ears on the hair side with salt when you salt the hide,It helps to fixate the hair.
This may seem like a stupid question BUT do you remove the cartilage before or after the tanning process? I split and leave it in until it gets back from the tannery. Jeff F.
Most people leave it in till after it is tanned.
First thanks to everyone for the help. I don't remove the cartilage before it is tanned, so thats not the problem. It may well be the the work over they get when I turn them, I will have to try and be a little more gentle on them.
Alex, I thought of the same thing just today. I fleshed one this afternoon and put some salt on the hair side for the first time to see if that helps.