How To: Skull Cleaning

[cnelk]

Its so cool to see these skulls after their bleached out.
You can see all the little parts & pieces of the head and how they work.

[skullclnr]

Cnelk you and I think the same, I love looking at the finished skull and seeing how the animal moved and how the skull dictates the shape of the head.

Heres and update on the coyote. Its out of the peroxide, and into a degreasing solution. I will post some pics later today. This is a very important step, the most important. We need to get all the grease and oil from the bone in-order for it to get white and more importantly stay white. Well go through this process in detail later.

Has anyone ever degreased their skulls before whitening?

[tmrschessie]

I used a lite beaching to some of my smaller skulls, but you have to be careful as it will deteriate the skull if it remains in bleach water very long. Tom

[skullclnr]

Just wanted to post some pics of the coyote out of the peroxide and into the degreaser. Well talk about the degreaser later, just wanted to keep the thread going....you can see how much cleaner the skull is in the first pics after coming out of the peroxide:

afterPeroxide.JPGafterPeroxide2.JPGdegrease1.JPGdegreasing2.JPG

[tmrschessie]

Really coming along nice. Is the hose in the last picture to let off pressure?

Great post, I see you have a couple wanting bugs already...Hope they don't raise them in the basement...Tom

[skullclnr]

Tom that is the cord for the aquarium heater, I put this in to keep the solution warm, it helps to pull out the grease.

K were at the step of degreasing...this can take anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. All we are trying to accomplish is to get all of the grease and oil from the bone. This also helps, if you haven't gotten all the flesh off to remove those last hidden 'treasures'. What I do is fill a Tupperware that will cover the skull, pour in half a cup of dawn dish detergent, half a cup of ammonia and let it sit with the heater on high. You will need to change this solution every few days as it gets cloudy. This process takes time so be patient. Once the water starts to stay clean, you can try and whiten (which we will cover soon) but don't rush this step. Other ways to degrease include, gasoline and white gas, very dangerous, and some commercial degreasers, also acetone, also dangerous. Most taxidermist use the dawn water combo, real tough skulls we will finish in acetone. Ill post a few pics in a few days of the skull moving along.

[tmrschessie]

Again, great post, Tom

[skullclnr]

Just an update, the skull continues to degrease...I will try and get some pictures later today. It starting to get cleaner and cleaner, once it stops making the water cloudy we will start to whiten. Like I said this is the step you have to have patience on, or your final product wont be as white as possible.

[MOHunter]

Originally Posted by cnelk

Here are 2 pics of a beaver skull.

Does anyone know why the front side of the front teeth are dark and the back side white? All other teeth are white too.

I don't why.

Attachment 1003

Attachment 1004

The front surface of the teeth in beaver are made up primarily of plaque. That is what allows them to be "self sharpening" instead of becoming flat-edged and dull. As the beaver chews and eats, it wears the front of the tooth at a different rate than the backside of the tooth creating a tapered edge which, in turn, makes for a sharp tooth.

[TEXTRACKER]

Wonderful, Where can you obtain the beetles from?

[TEXTRACKER]

Cancell that I sent you a PM

[skullclnr]

Hey all. Sorry I have been a little busy to get back to posting here but I got a chance to post tonight so here we go. Now the skull has been in the degreaser for a few weeks. I change it every other day. When the water looks like this:
degr1.JPG degr2.JPG degr3.JPG

You can see how cloudy the water has gotten. This is fat and oil from inside the bone. This is what will turn a skull yellow in the future. Again, I cant stress this enough this will take TIME, just be patient. This skull has been in for a few weeks now and is almost ready (these pics were taken a week ago).
Tomorrow I will take it out for the last time and we will get going on whitening the skull!!

[tmrschessie]

Trapping season is over for me this year so I am finding this post most interesting. Looks like some otheres are also. Thanks. Tom

[TEXTRACKER]

"I use a very high strength peroxide but you will have similar results with the brown bottle 3% stuff from the supermarket. Here we go into the peroxide to soak."

Can youelaborate a little more on the soak procedure

[skullclnr]

Tex- The peroxide soak is a preliminary measure that I just started this year. The skull is fresh out of the bugs and still is oily and just plain dirty. To jump start the degreasing process I soak it in peroxide over night give or take. This helps tremendously to pull the blood, exterior fat, and any meat left on the bone off as well as cleaning the inside cavity and getting it ready to degrease. Before when I was not doing this step I would put the skull strait into the degreaser, and have ot change the solution in a few hours and repeat every few hours. The solution would get real nasty and this would soak into the bone, making the whitening steps more drawn out. The soak can cut your degreasing time by weeks.

Heres an update on our coyote, I took it out of the degreaser two nights ago, and let it dry. It looks pretty good, there still may be a few pockets of grease, but I am going to go on to whitening and we will see. When using the whitening steps we will go through it is safe to whiten and then degrease and whiten again if you are not satisfied with the final product. I will post some pics and start the whitening procedure later today.