I am a begginer taxidermist. In the area I live in, we get alot of bears to be made into rugs. Many taxidermists send their bears to a tannery (with a 2-6 month wait). Is it worth my while to send the bears away to the tannery or invest in the equipment for tanning myself. My reason been is, rather then sit tight until the hides come back I would have work to do (and keep the $200 tanning, fleshing, turning charge), and turn out the rugs faster(what hunters dont love a taxidermist who can get their piece back in 3 months or less). Also what is a good source (books, video) to show me the process of it and how to make the pickle, degreaser, and nutralizer. Thanks
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to a tannery or you may end up with a stinky bear rug.You can do the fleshing,turning and salting. Make sure you get the toe bones out to the claw.This will save you money.If you do them your self you will most likely be doing 5 times more work in repairs.If you do the work on the bear you will pay about 20 bucks or so per L/F. thats not bad.
My understanding from your post is that you dont know anything about tanning. Theres alot more to tanning than just throwing something in a pickel or tan, and to break something and make it soft enough for a rug takes alot of man power and time. If you really want to invest in the equiptment to tan for yourself (im talking for rugs that you said your area gets alot of) its going to cost quite abit of $ (not a few hundred but several thousand, (and thats for out of date broken down equiptment)and then the room to put all the equiptment, and then learning to properly use it. The money you spend sending rug skins to a tannery is money well spent as well as sending the skin to someone that specializes in rug work. As for sitting tight untill your hides come back, If your work is good then you will build a customer base pretty quick and that means more work, no time to sit tight. Until then PRATICE. You said your just starting out,get some specimans mount them, You can never have enough pratice or enough display mounts and customers that come into your shop want to se you busy not just sitting around, and besides that you can allways put things you mounted for yourself up for sale and generate a little extra income while waiting for your rugs.