[Trophy Tracker]

I have seven racks in my freezer from deer that I have taken over the last couple of years. I want to have them european mounted but dont want to dish out the hundred bucks each to have it done. I figure I could do it alot less if I knew how. Any suggestions on how to do it and what to buy? I heard you have to boil 'em?

 

[Muratus]

I did mine last year. Didn't cost me a penny. Just allot of time.

It gets pretty nasty though, I'll warn you now.

Google it and you'll find a ton of ways to boil it & bleach it. I didn't bleach mine as I didn't want it to be pure white.

 

[ArchersParadox]

My good buddy who happens to be my taxidermist, too! sent away last year's buck to the "beetle box".

$65 and the skull looks as white as can be, no flaking nor chipping (I've tried to boil them before).

 

[Trophy Tracker]

$65 isnt too bad. If I could find someone to do them for $50 each then I would have them do it. Where does your buddy send them to? What kind of business has flesh-eating beetles?

 

[twogun]

I did one myself. I screwed a tree step into a tree and hung a five gallon bucket of water from it. I put the head in and tied the antlers to the tree incase the bucket fell. After several weeks (I don't remember how many but it was during colder weather. I'm sure it would be faster in hotter weather) I shot a hole in the bucket to drain the water and then rinsed the head off with the garden hose. I sloshed it around in a bucket of bleach water to finish it off. The two bones on the bridge of the nose fell off, the skull is still yellowed, and the horns bleached out from the sun. But it didn't cost me a dime.

It looks ok for hanging in or on a barn or shed, not really living room quality.

 

[Matt / PA]

We do a bunch........

They are easy to boil out, you just need a little patience, some soda ash and a big fat pot. :wink:
Skin em' down completely, remove the tongue, eyes, and as much flech as possible........fill the pot until the skull is sumberged to the bases of the antlers. Sprinkle in a palm full of soda ash and slow boil for about 4hrs, adding a little hot water as it evaporates now and then.
You'll want a nice open area for this because it stinks to rotten hell. :mg:
a buddy of mine has a portable electric burner which takes the stink to the open garage.
You also need some tools, old toothbrush,a hard bristle brush, picks, and old knife, shrimp forks and whatever you can find to pick and scape the stuff off.
The brains will shake out pretty easy and the meat will jelly off if you use the soda ash, scrub the inside of the skull with the toothbrush and rinse as you go with hot water.
If you get lots of stuff still stuck, back in the hot water for 20 min.
The nasal bones will pull off easily........take them out and clean gently. Set them aside.
The soda ash will also remove all the nasal cartilage.........no soda ash and it's a beeeaaaatch.
Get SODA ASH!!
You can scrub the entire deal down gently with a light bleach solution to disinfect and brighten slightly. Especially in the skull itself where it can smell a little funky. (Don't get bleach on the antlers!)
When you have the skull completely cleaned up you will want to super glue the nasal bones back into place.......Be gentle, they will slide in perfectly. Once in place rubber band the entire upper jaw area to hold the nasal bones tightly together. If you forget this step your screwed because once the skull dries completely it will set that way. Leave it banded for a few days to dry and then remove and mount how you want.

Here's an example of how we mount quite a few of our bucks.....they look great spread around the house and you can pick them up and look them over where with a wall mount you cannot.
Hope this helps!

 

[jdslyr]

I skin the scull and cut all the meat off that I can, eyes and tounge included. Boil for 4 hours without the antlers in the water. Scrape off anything left and boil and scrape as necessary. Once it is clean ,I mix powdered bleach and peroxide from a hair solon supply store. Get the most concentrated supplies you can. Mix it so it is like pancake batter. Spread on the entire scull getting into every crevice with a toothbrush without getting on the antlers so it dosen't bleach them. Put a white grocery bag over the antlers and rubber band it at the base of the antlers to prevent getting any on the antlers. Let it dry, rinse and repeat if necessary. It will be bone white. I like the tip of using soda ash and am going to try it. The whole process of skinning, boiling is tedious, time consuming, and a mess. A lot of picking and scraping involved. The key is to freeze the skull or do it when it is fresh. If you do it when it is fresh, it dosen't smell anymore than boiling dinner. I do mine in the kitchen. My wife came home one time and asked what I was cooking. When she saw the antlers sticking out or the pot, she said, what the???????????? Doing it outside on a turkey fryer would be something to consider.

 

[RHINO]

The scrape and boil method as described above is very common. I've done a few myself like that. I use a turkey deep fryer burner or the side burner on my grill so I can do it outside. Unless you live alone and like the smell of brain and tissue cooking... Outside is your best option.

Don't use regular chlorine bleach on skulls as it will weaken the bone. Try the beauty supply peroxide stuff they use to "bleach" hair. Or you can find a paste to do it at various taxidermy supply places.

You can start your own beetle colony for $67.50 and do as many skulls as you want.

Here's a link: www.skulltaxidermy.com

I've been considering doing this myself. I'm going on a bear hunt in a month and I paid $140.00 for a boil and bleach job from my last trip. This way I can do everyone's skull and still have the beetles for a few deer skulls this fall.

 

[Trophy Tracker]

Thanks!

Thanks to everyone for the great ideas and info. Special thanks to you Rhino! Great site! I'll be ordering those beatles in the morning!

 

[Cornfed]

Nothing compares to the museum quality that the Beetles can do. We have one local taxidermist that has these critters and the finished product is truly first class! Be sure to post pics of the finished product! :thumbs_up

 

[AJ008]

I did my buck for 20 bucks, just got to buy a pot and a board.
Boiling works great and its easy to do your self, but beattles will do less damage to you skull...

 

[rudy]

1

I have skinned the head back the best I could, bolied the skull over a old BBQ grill in a metal five gallon bucket. I had the base of the horns out of the water. Wrap tin foil around the edge of pail and around the base of horns as best you can. Boil for a few hours adding water as the steam escapes. Once done most all remaining skin and meat will fall off. Then fill another bucket with 50% water 50% hydrogen peroxide and let skull sit in solution for a coulpe days, remove skull hose off and you have a skull that is white as can be and clean to, also there is no noticable smell to skull once you are done. Looks good and relatively cheap.

 

[Sugar]

Skulls

Rudy... you don't want to boil the skull too long... Bring the water to a boil then drop the skull in for a lil bit till the meat starts to fall off. I do use sal soda ( available from any taxidermy supply) I never had a problem loosing any cartilige from the nasal cavity. Again I just dont boil it for hours on end. 15 Min or so... remove the meat ya can put it back in for 15 min or so... repeat repeat tills it all off.

Then I soak it in 100% peroxide unless I can find the hair salons use..its a higher cocentrate.

I soak it for a few days.. then put it in the sun that night back in the peroxide.. then back into the sun... I do this for a few days... Gule the teeth in and your set.

You can spray it with a polyurathane type of spray if you want but I never found it necessary. Good luck

 

[ArchersParadox]

$65 isnt too bad. If I could find someone to do them for $50 each then I would have them do it. Where does your buddy send them to? What kind of business has flesh-eating beetles?

here is his link:


http://www.danclarkstaxidermy.com/

here are some of the buck's he has done for me:

 

[smitteken]

Can i get some info on those beetles?

 

[Tapfoot]

This was $65.00

 

[flamethrower]

My first one, Skinned it, boiled it ,let the bug,s do the rest took a few month,s I think it came out good

 

[RHINO]

Rudy... you don't want to boil the skull too long... Bring the water to a boil then drop the skull in for a lil bit till the meat starts to fall off. I do use sal soda ( available from any taxidermy supply) I never had a problem loosing any cartilage from the nasal cavity. Again I just don’t boil it for hours on end. 15 Min or so... remove the meat ya can put it back in for 15 min or so... repeat tills it all off.

I agree. Boil it in smaller intervals, then scrape and rinse. Takes a little longer, but you can keep an eye on your progress better that way. I know a few guys that have ruined their skulls from "over cooking".

Now here is something I was thinking about...
I read in one of the "Homemade Scent Killer" threads that guys were using Baquacil (pool chemical) instead of the brown bottled hydrogen peroxide. Apparently, Baquacil is 27% hydrogen peroxide, where the brown bottle stuff is only like 3%. I'm curious if this would work better and faster for the whitening part of skull mounts.

Anyone have any thoughts or experience with this stuff?

 

[ratfart]

I did my first European mount last year and I plan to do all nice bucks this way in the future.
I will differ slightly on the boiling, I had to boil mine for quite a long time to get the stuff off. I did use a garden hose then to get most of the stuff off though, little scraping after the boil.
I used the Volume 40 peroxide from the local beauty supply. I think it works great. I also wanted to use the bottom jaw, so I threw it in the post as well and then superglued it together and then attached it to the skull with superglue. I like the way it looks having the jaw on there.
The last step was to spray some lacquer over the whole thing to give it a little shine. I like the outcome and will definitely do it again.

 

[ratfart]

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