Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Primitive Skills => Topic started by: BowEd on March 27, 2020, 12:55:55 pm
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The other day a neighboring varmint hunter dropped off a pair of close to prime local bobcats for me to tan.A tom and a female.He wanted the claws to stay on and stay cased.Got em skined/fleshed/and salted.I'll wait till they are flint dry and put each in it's own tanning bath in a 5 gallon bucket.
(https://i.imgur.com/zmaDBFu.jpg)
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Ed, sure ain't much fat on those cats, I'll be following this one to see how ya Tan these. Nice project for sure. Bob
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Bobcats are a dream to skin and flesh compared to beaver/badger/and coon.A lot less fat.
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They look creepy that way. Do you use natural materials to tan?
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I’ll be watching Ed. Nice job skinning.
Bjrogg
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Will be watching this also. You going to boil the skulls?
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From a thawed frozen state it's kind of a tedious process skinning and fleshing this way.If it were fresh and warm it woudl'nt have taken as long.Took just about 2 hours per hide.Key is to have a very sharp knife.Luckily they were not blown apart bad by the bullet.Just tiny enter and exit holes is all.
I started the process of setting the hair by salting and drying.By that I mean this.Each hair follicle has it's roots set into the epidermis in a little cavity of oily collegen type substance.Salt will dry that out.Extract all moisture from that cavity and the cavity area will shrink in size and tighten around that hair follicle root.Setting it into the hide.For preserving a hide for a later date it's a good way besides freezing it.
Use a fine grain pickiling salt.Massaged into the flesh side.Don't use rock salt.I get mine from a grocery store.Very cheap for a 4# box.
I will tan these using aluminum sulphate and pickling salt which has no iodine in it.An easy way to pickle or tan.Thinner hides soften easily using it.No pests that I know of eat it.Lasts for decades and resoftens after being wet.
Aluminum sulphate technically is a natural material as I understand it.It lowers PH in water or soil.Mixed with pickiling salt which is acidic it lowers the PH in the water.
It is used for many things.Most popular is to purify water from even unseen impurities.Very safe,cheap,and easy to get.It is used in cake mixes of various types also so ingested moderately will not kill you.It can irritate eyes if gotten into though just like salt.
Another way I tan or have tanned is with brains and don't use salt.A hair on brain tanned hides' hair gets set when it dries naturally.When storing hides to be brain tanned they are stored as rawhide.A light spraying of insectcide on them keeps the pests away over time,or use the good old freezer.Also with tannin water to bark tan and use salt while tanning but to store the hide I will use salt to dry.
The skulls the varmint hunter never discussed with me.I feel he does'nt care for them.I might flesh/debone/boil/clean up and bleach them.I don't know yet.I've already got bobcat skull but an extra skull or two does'nt hurt.
If you've ever seen a skinned bear carcass.They almost look human.Now that's creepy....Ha Ha.Or better yet seen a coyote infected with the sarcoptic mange.They almost look alien.Terrible way to die.
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going to boil the skulls and keep them?
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Thanks for the info! I've got a deer skin in my deep freeze right now
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Allyn T...Your deer hide should be good yet if your freezer has stayed running all this time.
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The weather here this spring has turned to be warmer/windier/and high humidity during this time of year.It is stormy out.I have hung the 2 bobcat hides inside the house to dry quicker in lower humidity.
For hair-on flat hides to salt like beaver and such you can lay them on a surface flesh side up on a slight slant to drain fluids.Use a fine salt...Not rock salt.Massage it into flesh side well.I buy canning salt...cheap....from grocery store.
Now that they are fiint dry I made my tanning bath solutions.Be sure your hide is fleshed very good before inserting into tanning bath and even before salting.
2 pound aluminum sulphate and 4 pound pickling salt into around 3 to 4 gallons of water in each bucket.Dizzolving it in hot half ration of water first.Then adding other half of cold water to cool water off.I like stronger solutions to reduce time the hide is wet.
I put each hide into it's own bath.
I estimate around 2 to 4 days for these thinner skinned bobcats or 6 to 8 days for a single deer hide or large beaver.This all depends on how big the individual hide is.You cannot ruin it by leaving it in an extra day,or by making the bath too strong,but I would reccommend to not leave it in bath much more than a week.
A natural hide is not an even thickness thickness leather anyway but needs to be left in there till the thickest part is tanned.
A good test is to cut a strip off at a thick edge.It should show white clear through it.Any difference of translucency color needs more time.
There are products out there from taxidermy catalogs to put in bath to deter bacteria but if your worried I would use 2 tablespoons of concentrated lysol into a solution of this size. That would be around a tablespoon to every gallon of water.
Stirring it or rearranging the position of each hide 3 to 4 times a day.
(https://i.imgur.com/DQ5vCX5.jpg)
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Can't wait to see the results
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I'll do my best Allyn T.I'll describe too how I oil it before working it to soften.
I struck a deal with this fella.A trade.He wants the Tom and will give me the female.To keep money or currency out of the equation.This type trade keeps away the need to buy a state taxidermy license then also.
I have plans for mine in the future of making a useful item out of it.The plastic harvest tag will then be removed from mine.His will hang his by the nose in his house somewhere.Those of us that enjoy fur and even the handling of it enjoy it in our own way.
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The more modern the world gets the more I want to regress into the past. I say this while writing on my smart phone : (
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My sentiments exactly....Well it's been 3 days the hides have been in the tanning bath.I checked slicing a sliver on the smaller hide and it is ready.
I take another bucket with 3 to 4 gallons of luke warm water and put a good shot of dawn dish washing soap in it.I invert the hide hair side out and give it a good cleaning.I invert it again to clean the flesh side too.I then rinse it in 3 to 4 changes of clean water.
(https://i.imgur.com/OBkd7OT.jpg)
I then go to my fleshing beam and squeegee out as much water from the hide as possible while giving it a good refleshing removing any remaining bits and pieces of membrane.If you have no fleshing beam wring as much water out as possible.You should if you fleshed the hide....Ha Ha.At this time you can sew any holes that you would like to sew.
(https://i.imgur.com/bIYkkdm.jpg)
I then use an old garbage bag to lay the hide onto before oiling it.I will use 1 to 1 ratio of neats foot oil water and pre warm it double boiler wise on the stove.Just warm enough you can just keep your finger in it.I apply it to the hide with a paint brush doing 1 side,flipping over and doing the other side.You can massage it in also but I've never seen a benefit from doing that.
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I then invert it back to hair side out and roll it up to soak in or sweat in over night or for 12 hours.
(https://i.imgur.com/NL5PGN5.jpg)
It's basically a race to get things dry now.I folded mine in half and put a low running fan on it to dry the hair faster.
(https://i.imgur.com/XV8ejnu.jpg)
I will show further progress later.I should mention if you are oiling a hide not cased or flat just folding it into 1/4ers' will work fine too.
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why do you oil the hide?
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Good question......To help make the leather be more supple and soft while stretching and pulling the hide while it dries.Too dry of a hide or leather can be susceptable to tearing if too dry and stiff while stretching.The fibers in the leather need to be moved to get soft.
Neats foot oil will emulsify with water and penetrate into the damp leather while the leather dries.It is made from cattle hooves.It's the best stuff for this type of tanning.
It does'nt work so well to let the hide dry first before oiling.Too much can be applied and get too oily.Then the leather does'nt have any chance of breathing corresponding itself to the changes in the moisture content of the enviornment.It can lead to the leather actually rotting and losing it's integrity.
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The hair is pretty much dry now so I've inverted it now to let the flesh side of hide to dry while being stretched different directions.I don't like to put the fan on it at this stage.I like to let it naturally air dry.It can dry too fast with a fan on it most times at this stage of drying.
(https://i.imgur.com/PYdkFS9.jpg)
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(https://i.imgur.com/hCSVzLA.jpg)
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would hanging the hide make it dry faster?
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You could but not really and a person does not want it to dry too fast without stretching it.The hide needs to be stretched all directions as it dries.I would say more than 50% of the time as it is drying it is in hand and being worked.A bit like roping a brain tanned hide but not as intense.Stretching it all directions helps with the drying.It opens the fibers to the air better.If a person wants nice supple soft leather it needs to be worked and stretched while drying with this type of tanning.
Almost dried areas will be a transluscent blue color before stretching.After stretching they will be egg shell white and soft.
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If something comes up for an hour or so and you can't baby sit the hide stretching it you can roll it up and put it in a plastic bag twisted tightly shut to prevent it from drying too much with out stretching.
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So you are just stretching at out and letting it air dry? Not breaking it over a cable like braintanning a deer hide? Interesting.
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Did you oil the hair side too?
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knsow.....Yes mostly.I did rope it a little bit for some abrasion and stretching,but mostly stretched it different directions as it dried.Drying and softening an aluminum suplhate tanned hide is a lot easier than roping a brain tanned deer hide.A hide tanned with this stuff does not have the spring back action as brain tanned leather nor the puffed up feature of roped brain tanned hides does roped but gets nice and supple yet.It's like a flannel shirt.Good enough for me.
Pictures of how the tan looks.Egg sell white.Very soft like a flannel shirt.The tan lasts for decades.Will soften if it gets wet with a little stretching.
(https://i.imgur.com/GhQftmT.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/OiwGSVo.jpg)
Allyn T....No I do not oil the fur side.My girl friend Robin had some spray foam stuff to shampoo her dogs with occasionally.I tried a little on the fur side of the bobcat.It worked very well and it's shiny clean now.Better than the dawn dish washing soap clean up.
Well that's 1 down and 1 to go.I sewed it's mouth shut and ear holes shut.I will put a rawhide or veg tanned leather cup 4" deep into it's head and face.I have thoughts of making another side cat quiver out of this one and it's a real cat this time....Ha Ha.I will do that later after I finish the next cat.It took 4 to 5 hours off and on to finish this one drying and softening.It's a native scruffy Iowa bobcat.
(https://i.imgur.com/QwGSYcu.jpg)
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My idea for another cat quiver I did before on a fisher colored coon and a beef rawhide quiver.It involves using a dogwood stiffener with a portal to get the arrows from.I split the dogwood and let it dry a couple days to set to make the portal.Drill 1/16th inch holes along each side of the portal to sew it to the leather opening.The leather opening on the hide I reinforced with a strip of deer brain tan for better durability.
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Might need to style it after this quiver but without the beadwork as the back end or opening the arrows go into of this bobcat is rather large.I don't want to cut up this bobcat into a tube for a cat quiver.
(https://i.imgur.com/GasROYE.jpg)
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Got the other cat cleaned,refleshed,and oiled.It's a bit bigger kitty.Got the fan on drying the hair.
This one will go to it's owner to do with what he wants.
(https://i.imgur.com/pbo7MWM.jpg)
Now that the hair is dry it's back to the same process of drying as the previous hide.There is a little residual neats foot oil showing on it yet but I'm going to leave it on to soak in.
(https://i.imgur.com/9wZxEDf.jpg)
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While other hide is drying I decided to make that cat quiver style anyway or thought I could pull it off decently so I made a thick veg tanned cup to insert into the face of the future quiver.This will reinforce this area from field tip and broad head abuse.I do this by making a card board template first that fits just right and then transferring that template to veg tanned leather.Sewing it together.Inserting it and driving it home with a broom stick of sorts.I did contact cement the top edges of this cup to hide yet.
(https://i.imgur.com/DFQ0nbo.jpg)
I skive the edges of leather first to prevent arrow tips from catching on there.
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I darkened the eye holes with a magic marker.I think it looks better.
(https://i.imgur.com/NFu2rVn.jpg)
She's ready for a stiffener stick now and a strap.
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Thank you for the response. I may have to give that a shot with some hides next year, with fur prices being in the tank.
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Nice part is there's probably only 2 to 3 dollars worth of aluminum sulphate and picking salt into the hide to tan it.Just as cheap or cheaper than brain tanning.
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Finished last cat.Took a little longer to dry and soften but not much more than previous hide.This one a little over 3' long.The other around 30" long.That's nose to tip of tail.I'm a little surprised as to how thick the larger Toms' hide actually was.It could probably have been used for a shorter bow to be carried in.
(https://i.imgur.com/4gQGkKU.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/I1XabP7.jpg)
With most other tanning baths it's wise to get ones self some PH testing papers to check alkalinity.Using them according to the instructions of your type of tan.Proper PH helps the hide get tanned more efficiently with a better type tan and to stay away from bacteria.With this type of tan I did'nt check it.I should of I guess but I'm not one for technical details but it is a good idea anyway.I guess I've done this type tan so many times with good success and I usually usually brain tan too with no technical details I disregard it.
The off set of aluminum sulphate [An alkaline] and pickling salt [An acid] in the combination of 1 to 2 is usually close enough.I think the bath is supposed to be below 2 with a test of litmus paper.
Cheap item to buy from a taxidermy supply.Less than $5.00.I used Van Dykes Taxidermy supply.
(https://i.imgur.com/CDVOWpw.jpg)
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Got the stiffener on.Just need a strap for it yet.
(https://i.imgur.com/VYJ27NH.jpg)
The varmint hunter was by to pick up his tanned hide.Told me to leave it on my porch outside.Said he wanted to practice distance socializing.
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Said he wanted to practice distance socializing.
covid time
very interesting tutorial :OK
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Finished up on the carrying strap this morning.Nothng too special.Just functional made out of leather and canvas.For something I make to be utilitarian type I don't usually jazz it up with much beadwork where wear and tear can lead to continual repairs.I call it done.
(https://i.imgur.com/bSXbwUE.jpg)
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It'll hold upwards of 2 dozen arrow shafts.On to the next project.
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I don’t know how I missed this Ed. Fantastic thread and that is a awesome quiver.
Always enjoy your tanning threads.
Thanks
Bjrogg
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Just outstanding work. Thanks for the how to.
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Thanks fellas....Really no ambitions to write a book.Credit can be given to those who showed me.These things are just my versions of them done my way.
Animals natural shapes many times can dictate for me what can be made out of them,if you don't want to trim much off of them.For instance the shape of an otter would suit a side or cat quiver better.It is more tubular shape encased right off the bat.Many types of quivers just as functional out there to use though.
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Very nice Ed, I like that a lot. :)
Pappy
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Thanks Pappy...I see you guys make countless various things I like at your shop too that are top notch.