Hi, I'm hoping you can help me. I have a beautiful buffalo skull I purchased about 6 years ago. It was bleached, not cured out on the prairie. The 2nd summer I had it, magots bodys were found underneath it, from what I believe was the teeth. This summer, I decided to hang it on a wall, and noticed small dander of some sort underneath it on the floor. I took it down and shook it, and a lot of old dead magot bodys feel out of it. I've vacuumed it several times, and tried putting powdered Seven on it and putting the skull in a plastic bag to kill off any bugs etc. No luck, I found fresh tiny magots, or larve of some sort inside the horns, and when shaking the skull, there are still many large dead magot bodys still coming from inside the skull. What can I do to stop this? Any advise would be very appreciated. I live in Washington State, and it seems to only be a problem in the hot summer months. Thanks, Eagleheart
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Put it in your freezer for a couple of hours if you think you still have bugs in it. I use my air compressor with a blower tip to blow out all the holes, nose cavity and brain area. Then spray it with non yellowing clear coat spray (walmart or kmart). Hope this helps.
it sounds like the horns were never seperated from the skull and there is a lot of meat under them horns. try to pull the horn off and clean out any meat, you may need to soak the skull in water for awhile to do this. once the horn is off clean the inside real well. simply bondo the horns back on after its all cleaned. you can use some bug stuff on them if you want. good luck.
Those are dermestid beetle larvae. I had a European deer mount that was ten years old and after all that time I one day found "saw-dust" looking powder underneath it and the shell casings from the larvae. And this mount was previously boiled and treated with hydrogen peroxide for bleaching.
So, I inspected it and cut the back of the skull off where the spinal cord goes into the brain cavity and sure enough there was a small amount of tissue still in the brain cavity. Mine was fragile so I did not want to reboil it, I was able to get the dried meat out and fill the whole brain cavity with bondo. No problems since.
If I were you, I would try and boil the skull. There is residual meat under the horns, in the brain cavity, or in the nasal cavity. Take a flash light and shine it into these areas and see if you can see any tissue.
Sounds like dermestids are still in the skull. Whatevewr it is the water will kill it and bacteria will consume them. When finished ,about a week, put it in water and peroxide to kill any bacteria still alive on it.Dry in the Sun.
There must be some sort of dreid meat still inside the skull . What your geting is bettle larva . You can do what Tony said or even freeze it for a few days first to kill them .Rick
Thank you Tony and Newbirdman. Unfortunatley I don't have a freezer large enough to accomidate the large skull. I live in a small apartment. I will check with some of the stores in town to see if they rent freezer space for a couple of days. Do you know if these larva are harmful to anything else in my living space? I know that there are some bugs and larva that could eat at sheet rock, and I don't want any damage to the apartment. The year that it happened the worst it was the skull was on the carpet, yet there were no signs of damage to the carpet. Eagleheart
Eaglehart, Definitly not maggots, what you found was dermestid larva "hulls" left when they became little flying creatures in search of another place to lay more eggs. They eat organic material (but not bone)so unless you have wool carpeting there won't be a problem with the landloard. The situation you describe is common with quickly prepared skulls that leave tissue in the hard to clean areas. In my opinion, boiling the skull will not help but might ruin the skull. Soaking in water also will have little benefit unless you soak long enough for the bacteria to eat up all remaining tissue. In doing this the skull would likely stain and darken requiring whitening again. Your skull seems to have tissue down in the horn cores and you should be aware that they will also eat the horn covers themselves. Often the problem with bison or cattle skulls is also in the blade shaped bone that runs up the center of the skull in the lower area of the nasal passage way. This bone is hollow yet filled with a cartilage material that lasts for years and is not destroyed by boiling. It will draw critters and leak oil if not cleaned out or removed. If the problem should indeed just be a little tissue in the horn cores and small places you might solve the problem by soaking for 2 days then remove to double trash bags and place in dog proof area outside to sweat the skull 2 or 3 weeks. In this time most superficial tissue will rot in warm weather. If the problem is, as I suspect, also in that blade shaped bone you will have to leave it bagged much longer and I would split the bone. Maybe you have a taxidermist in your area that can look at it for you and determine your needs. -Aaron H.
The bugs won't hurt anything other than perhaps other mounts, but freezing it or soaking it in water won't cure the problem. It may kill the bugs for now, but they will be back. The only way to cure this is to clean up the skull. Being lazy, I even tried to leave my deer skull in a shed for the summer hoping the bugs would eat all the meat for me, and no luck. I had to clean the skull up.
Hi Everyone,
I called my sister/friend in Oregon and told her about the beetle larve problem, and she called me back an hour later with an offer from a taxidermist friend of hers that lives on her street. I'll be visiting her in the fall, and will take the skull with me. He has something that will kill all the bacteria in and on the skull without having to get it wet. Thanks again, Eagleheart