After I skin the animal (raccoon) how do I properly salt it ---
what do I store it in
how much salt
can I stack skins
how long can I keep the skins in the salt
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Pretty basic stuff with years of knowledge already posted, just use the search button on the left.
Thanks John but I have searched the archives and I didn"t find any answers to my particular questions.
But I did find that I should flesh the skin before slating or the salt won"t penetrate, which brings me to another question. Since I don"t have a fleshing knife do I bother salting at all, should I just freeze the skin.
hello david, im rather new to taxidermy, but the way i did a raccoon and fox was. first i skinned it out being careful not to leave any meat on the skin because i dont like to flesh.lol, but if you do skin it all out and some meat remains just make sure you take the big chunks of meat off, make sure to turn the ears, split nose and lips and eyes before stalting. you dont really need a special knife for this, i just use a scalpel. after this is done, make sure to put plenty of salt in the turned ears, legs and feet, tail if your doing a full mount. put plenty of salt all over the skin then roll up in a ball with the salt inside, after 24 hrs or so, shake the salt out and repeat all the salting. then you can set it aside to dry, what i like to do while its drying is, while drying it makes it easy to pull all the fat off the animal so i like to do that. once dry you can just leave it aside until your ready to tan. if your gonna tan yourself just rehydrate it in the pickle and proceed with the tanning.