I was planning on mounting a corsican ram soon, but I am an amature at best. Done mostly deer and other gameheads, no exotics. What is the trick to mounting the hide around the horns? Not alot of room to play there. Do some take the horns off the skull plate cores then attach later, or do the horns stay on? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
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I have done a few of them myself. Of couse take the caps off to clean them, if you don't you will never get rid of the rotten smell. I cut the cores about 5 inchs from the skull. This makes it easier to put them back on when you get ready to mount. When you get the skull plate screwed to your form put the core back on sometime you will need the aid of a block of wood to get them where they go. It is important to get them all the way on or you will have a gap between the cape and horns. Next I put my mache over the skullcap, make sure you do this after putting the caps back on or you might knock it loose. When I put my first couple of stitches in I stop and hammer in some hide nails around the horns to keep the skin where I want it then procede with sewing.
If this is your first one get several catalogs to look at because they all carry different sizes. I have used the ones from Van Dykes and Joe Coombs.
Hope this helps if you have anymore questions just ask, But I am sure there are some folks on here with different maybe easier methods than mine. If there is Let me know.
Rob
There's stuff between the horn and core that needs to be cleaned out, dired out and treated. I'll drill 1/8" holes on the back sides of each horn maybe 3-4 inches up from the bases. Drill through the horn and into the boney core but not out the other side of the horn. Then, with the skull plate cut away from the skull, drill from the inside of the skull plate down into the boney core with a 1/4" bit as far as you can go without coming out of through the horn. Lay the rack against something so that the skull plate faces up. That way you can pour water down into the 1/4 inch holes. Do this for a few days as the horn begins to rot. It will loosen up the horns from the cores faster this way. Once you can get them seperated try scraping out what you can from the inside of the horns and off of the skull plate. I then wash with detergent inside the horns and treat with dry preserve. Then I stuff news paper as a plug to stop the plaster I'm applying next. Apply plaster in to fill maybe 1" deep from the base of the horn and let dry. This will keep the base shape intact as the horn dries. Otherwise it could warp and not fit well back onto the skull plate. Let the horns dry this way for maybe a week. Remove the plaster by tapping with a hammer and shake out excessive DP.
I like that plaster Idea. I have had trouble in the past with a couple not wanting to fit back on the cores. I had to grind the cores with a 4" grinder to get them to fit back on.
Rob