Stuart Weniger
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Zach
The craziest was a baboon sitting on a toilet for a clients guest bathroom, and the most difficult was a couple of life-size elands, just because of their size.Zach
I was a taxidermist for 40 or so years (now retired) and over that period of time I have done many many european mounts, and had a lot of African skulls cleaned. During that time I have tried many different types of cleaning (no anthills) from boiling to just rotting them in water to hanging them in a tree for nature to takes it coarse. The beetle method is less messy and gets a quality job.The cost usually depends on the size of the skull mount and if you want both top and bottom jaw cleaned. There is also many options to have them camoed, metal plated, mounted on a panel etc. It’s been a couple of years since I sent any off but at that time wholesale costs were around $70.00 to $120.00 for the top skull and about another $25 or so for the bottom jaw (prices vary depending on the size and service provider). Then additional if you want any other treatements.
I hope this helps.
stuartZach
You may have a local taxidermist that can do this or send it off for you but if you want to save some money you can do this yourself. There are many companies that specialize in this type of skull cleaning. You can start your search by going to http://www.taxidermy.net and look at skull cleaning under the suppliers tab. I recommend two that I have used over the years that produce museum quality work and you don’t have to worry about the skulls coming back with bugs still in them. They are Montana Skull Works in Libby Montana and Skulls Unlimited in Oklahoma City. Both should have online pricing. All you will need to do is freeze the skull then ship it UPS or FedEx on a Monday so it will be received that week and does not sit around on a truck over the weekend. I have shipped hundreds of skulls this way.Good luck in your search.
StuartZach
Keep us posted on your progress. I have the same boat and have been babying it for the last several years fearing it is going to wear out. This has been the best pontoon that I have fished from even after trying several others over the years. I wish that I had purchased two of them at the time just for a spare.Good luck.
StuartAfter seeing all the responses I have jump in and tell you the proper way to treat these wings. As a taxidermist for over 30 years I have seen my share of mistakes that people make with their fly tying materials. One of them is improper preparation of their bird feathers.
To start with split the wings on the under side of the wing all the way to the last joint with a knife or scalpel. For fly tying purposes remove all the bones, humerous, radius, metacarpals. Once the bones are removed all remaining meat and fat needs to be removed from the skin and around the feather quils that protrude into the skin. You can do this by scrapeing it off with the end of your knife or by using a wire brush in a drill motor (much faster but messy). I use a commercial bird flesher which is a wire brush on a motor encased in an acrylic housing to catch all the fat and goo that is thrown off of the skin.
Once the skinning process is finished the wing needs to be washed to remove any blood, lice, mites, or fat from the fleshing process. Place the whole wing in a sink and fill with cold water and a mild detergent soap, Dawn dish soap works well. Allow this to soak for 30 minutes, then rinse and towell dry. Once the washing process is complete the wings can be dried with a shop vac turned around to blow air. Just blow them until they are completly dry. All the under fluff should be fluffed back to original. The feathers when dry will re-marry and should fluff back the the original state and even better since they are clean.
At this point you can place some Borax on the inside of the skin. Borax is a bug deterent not a bug killer, they do not like the taste of borax. The bugs you are woried about are Dermestid Beetles which attack anything with protene in it. If you prepare the skin properly and all fat and flesh is removed you will not have problems with your bird feathers/skins.
I acutally de-fat and wash even my neck hackles and any skins that I purchase. It seems that even the best neck hackles still have fat attached to them and the producers remedy is to put a fat absorption pack behind the neck.
I hope this helps
Stuart
