I read a post on some slipping and McKenzie tan and you referenced that a wet cape will have loose hair. I'm not a beginner but I am new to using tans (DP'd in the past). I understand the wet capes will loosen hair but here is the deal. I did a fox over the weekend and finally put him back in the cooler till I could figure out what the hell was going on. Prior to starting no problems salted, fleshed, pickled, tanned (McKenzie) then rinsed excess tan off then tumbled for fifteen minutes. Now the skin was still damp and as I was working the hide over the form my thumb slid across his forehead and rolled a piece of epidermis with the hair attached off the size of a nickle. In your opinion is that because it was still wet? I am starting to think so.
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What you just described is manual slip. You can push off the epidermis when the hide is soft or damp after being hydrated. It does not have to fall off to be slip; you have to be gentle when you handle any hide that is hydrated. In addition, if you read in the archives, George has said many times that a fox or coyote will slip just because that is what they do. I remember my first deer, after I had it sewed up, I started to groom it before it was dry, and pushed off a spot the size of the palm of my hand because I pushed to hard around the shoulder area trying to move an air bubble out. After a pickle and neutralizing on any hydrated skin, you can tug in any spot and you can get hair to come out, stop pulling, that is not slip. Slip in a raw specimen is an area that has started to break down and decompose. Slip can show up anytime along the way, Bob from Hog Heaven yesterday pointed out that slip after a pickle is because of the neutralizing ph to high, or because of soaking to long in it. I don't know doo doo about the facts of slip, I just know from my short stint in taxidermy that a moist hide can be damaged just by the way it is handled while mounting, and some of the problems are man made, and some of the slip problems were there to begin with before the skinning started due to poor field care. Prolonging the skinning, fleshing or any step along the way because you are slow or just learning will create slip spots also. Some specimens are prone to slip, that is why George Dp's them. Get them done quick. Tanned hides vs. a fresh raw DP hide have to be handled different as they are totally hydrated and slightly fragile. IMO
Somebody is going to say to use Krowtann, and somebody else is going to say to use stop rot and none of these problems will ever show up.
I believe in stop rot and use it. I stop rot the head and ears on every deer I do, and occasionally, very occasionally after the pickle and tan while mounting, I still get a small slip spot behind the ears and head, not very often. Doesn't matter what tan I use. I have read several post of slip showing up after being Krowtanned, it's in the archives. I believe the tan does not cause it. It's in my process, or there before I started.
Thanks for a good response. I never just pull hair to pull hair but my thumb just slipped and presto bald spot. I am going to dry that fox better I guess and cut that bad spot out. I had talked to Bruce about this before I started and was worried about using ez100 because of all the soaking. I guess this shows it can happen with just about product if a mishap happens. What part of the country are you in? I am south of Houston in Pearland.