SC - Deerhide help (kinda-sorta on topic)

[Philippa Alderton]

OK, Iasmin, I'm jumping ;-)

As far as removing the hide, make sure your guy knows what he's doing.
Basicly, the technique is to pull the hide away from the flesh, and sever
the connective tissue- if you cut into the meat, you're messing up a rather
neat package, and if you cut into the hide, you'll have holes, which will
make it fairly worthless, if you have more that one or two.

I'm assuming here, that your guy is butchering the standard way- a slit from
the throat to the vent, slits up the inside if the legs, and rings around
where you want the hide to end, on the legs, and the neck.

Easiest way to skin a large animal is to hang it. I prefer head down, others
will argue head up, but head down is easiest for me. To do this
convenie4ntly, make a careful slit in the hing legs between the bone and the
Achilles tendon- that way you can slip a rope through, if you don't have a
hanger, or you can slip the hooks from the hanger through.

The areas to be most careful with are around the legs- very thin skin, takes
a bit of doing to pull it away intact- around the vent and genitals, either
gender- same problem. There are other slow areas- just take your time, and
feel the "grain" of the animal.

The best edible bits have likely been thrown away in the field dressing- the
heart, kidneys, liver and sweetbreads are likely still back in the field- I
don't suggest going back after them ;-)Obviously, if he's wanting a trophy,
the brains aren't available either. Penis and testicles are quite edible-
see Ras for testicle recipes.

As far as useful, non-edible parts, of course there's the hide- I'll get
into that in a bit, after you get it off. The legs, from the knees down are
saveable- many folks fold them, dry them, and use them as coat hooks, or a
gun rack under the trophy. The best part to get, though, of the parts that
most folks don'r save, is the sinew. This is a white/silvery ribbon running
fron the hip up the spine. It is distinctly inedible, but makes very nice
threat for sewing leather. To harvest it, look for it, then slip a very dull
knife- a butter knife wil work- between it and the carcass, and lift and
slide it out. You'll lose a bit of meat here, but only a few ounces. BTW-
there's one on each side.... When you get that, clean it of carefully,
removing all muscle tissue, and put it aside- you're wanting to let it dry.
Do not leave it out where your cat or dog can get to it- they can't digest
it, but they'll certainly try. Once it's good and dry, you can split it into
fairly fine threads.

As far as the hide goes, clean out the inside of all meat and connective
tissue, if you can, before you dry it. You can do it later, but it's much
easier to do fresh. Once you've done that, lay it out somewhere flat, flesh
side up, and salt the bloody blue blazes out of it- an inch or so of salt is
about right- and leave it alone to dry- a fan in the room, to help circulate
air will speed things up. Once it's dry, you can put it up and keep it dry-
if you think you'll do this more than once, save the salt and use it again.

If you want to get your taxidermist to tan it, fine, but be prepared to pay
a good buck. If you'd like to try doing it yourself, you can go to:

http://www.healingearth.com/btan1.html

for braintanning and a lot of links, or Tandy Leather has kits for sale at:

http://www.tandyleather.com/products.asp?dept=21&pagenumber=2

Either Tannit or Tannery in a box will work- I like the latter because it
was easier for me to just buy it, and replace the chemicals when needed.

NOTE!!!!

With deer hides, take the hair off unless you want the thing shedding for
the next 10 years, until all the hair falls our. Deer hair is a hollow fiber
which tends to shed, unlike the hair of most NA mammals.

Hope this helps.....


Phlip

Nolo disputare, volo somniare et contendere, et iterum somniare.

phlip at morganco.net

Philippa Farrour
Caer Frig
Southeastern Ohio

"All things are poisons.  It is simply the dose that distinguishes between a
poison and a remedy." -Paracelsus

"Oats -- a grain which in England sustains the horses, and in
Scotland, the men." -- Johnson

"It was pleasant to me to find that 'oats,' the 'food of horses,' were
so much used as the food of the people in Johnson's own town." --
Boswell

"And where will you find such horses, and such men?" -- Anonymous