I know beetles are great for cleaning skulls for European mounts, but I don't have a box of pet beetles.
So, I dug out a few inches of a fireant mount and set my dried skull down inside of it and covered it with the cut-off end of a barrel.
It's an experiment for me at the moment, but I'm wondering if any of you guys have had any luck using ants/fireants to clean skulls with.
What I did was I soaked the skull to return some moisture to it (had it dried in salt) and then coated it with corn syrup. I am hoping they will eat the rest of the material.
I just soaked mine in a bucket of water for about a month. Submerge it only upto the antler bases. In the warm months bacteria that forms in the water will clean it right up, just spray it off with a hose...then whatever whitening u choose.
Eric
I tried it a couple times years ago but coyotes or bears or some other scavengers came along and took the heads.
I have had good luck with maggots. take a 5 gallon bucket with a lid, drill a bunch of 3/8
holes in it all the way around the bucket,put
your skull in it and seal the lid back up, hang
it on a fence post or up a tree if you have varmints and leave it for a month or so in the heat of the summer. flies fill it with the maggots and the skull come out slick and clean.
if a 5 gal bucket is not gig enough you can go
with any container that will hold it. I have always done it this way for hog skulls and it works great.
I do taxi work and use beetles on my euros. You will find that the ants will work, however plan to get stung some with that process. You will also be fighting cleaning up the dirt and such that sets into the skull itself. Not an impossible thing to clean up or get nice and white, but you are in for a little more work.
Masceration (putting the skulls in water) works just as well, as Westbrook mentioned above.
If you have questions or need any help, I'd be happy to help. Good luck!
Have not tried ants but I buried a skull up to the antlers of a small buck and covered it with a plastic trash bucket with a cinder block on it (to keep the big critters off) for the fall into winter. Checked late spring and hosed it off (did not wire the jaw bones) and put it in a bucket of bleach water. Hang it in the yard as the wife stated that is not coming in the house.
Here how she turned out which was originally done about 5 years ago.
(http://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh625/922TradBowHunter/BR10.jpg)
i boiled and simmered mine, but never did finish it while it was fresh and then i forgot about it until recently, so i rehydrated it by putting it in a 5 gal. bucket with enough water to cover the skull.
it sat for about a month,...shewwyy' it stunck!
when i pulled it out i figured i would have to pick all the junk off of it,
but it came out clean . all the junk had just fallen off in the bucket.
then i used peroxide and hair bleach to brighten it up some, turned out pretty good.
(http://i958.photobucket.com/albums/ae69/arrow30_photos/003-9.jpg)
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I think I may take it out of the yard and put it in a pot of water to soak. I have a screened porch on an old farm house on the property that I can leave it so I dont have to smell it rot.
Im too impatient to wait for little ants to do it. Its been there for a few weeks, but they are working a bit too slow for me.
I will check it in a little bit but I expect it to look about the same as last time. they aren't as awesome as beetles.
If you just soak it in water make sure that it is under a roof. The direct sunlight well start whitening the antlers. The month or so it takes to clean the skull will lighten the antlers quite a bit.
I have done a couple hundred of european mounts (The byproduct of my father running a deer processing business and my studies in business school) and have found that boiling them in sodium bicarbonate and the pressure washing them to be the fastest and most efficient way to clean them. Pressure wash the brains out first or you'll have a heck of time with them later. I did get my time for cleaning a skull down to about an hour with 45 minutes being the boiling time. Slow rolling boil is the key and plenty of sodium bicarbonate but it works really well and there is no waiting. I have also done a few rams and larger skulls with beetles you can buy them online if you search dermestid beetles and they are fairly reasonable <30 for 50 or 100 which is all you need. Just be sure to keep them contained and submerge the skull in boiling water as soon as you pull it out to kill any that remain inside. Hope this helps.
Just soaked in bucket of water. Pick clean/hose off once a month or so. Change water at same time. Don't let antlers get sun bleached. No peroxide needed on this one. It came out white like bugs did it.
(http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c318/b1r9i6a6n/101_0117_1.jpg)
(http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c318/b1r9i6a6n/Recurveskullfront.jpg)
QuoteOriginally posted by whitetail_downer100:
have found that boiling them in sodium bicarbonate
Hahahaha, not as manly to call it baking soda? lol. Thanks fella.
I don't keep gas on hand to boil/cook with because I think it's a huge waste of money and I never grill with gas.
I may just put a pot on my smoker to get it to boil. I'm not going to stink up the house with a putrifying skull.
You can boil them, just do it at a very low temp. The heat from "boiling water" will break down the bone and make it brittle. Depending on how much meat is left on the skull, baking soda will get it off, no problem. Mix a little clear dawn dish soap in if you go that route to help degrease the skull. If you do not degrease, then over time the fats and grease will leach out and it will turn yellow.
On the beetles, I have several thousand in my old chest freezer, which is my beetle box. They clean up a skull in just a few hours to a day or so.
My favorite method is beetles, followed by maceration.
Here are a few that I've done recently. Aoudad, blackbuck, bobcat, mountain lion and whitetail.
(http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/JPhilen/IMG_0008.jpg)
(http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/JPhilen/IMG_0010.jpg)
(http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/JPhilen/IMG_0041.jpg)
(http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/JPhilen/2012-05-02_06-23-36_752.jpg)
(http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/JPhilen/IMG_0031.jpg)
I tried the ant hill thing several years ago. Buried a bull elk skull in an ant hill in camp in Colorado and left it for 3 weeks. Time to go home to Illinois so I took it out and was surprised, it looked just like it did when I put it in. Didn't work but maybe I needed to leave it longer.
Guys, I have a bear head in my freezer that I've been waiting to do. If I use the bucket of water method do I have to remove the brain? Does the water just take of business?
i'd say remove as much brain as you can before you put it in the bucket, if you got hot weather it should be done in 3-4 weeks.
My buddy put his bear skull in a 5gl plastic bucket cut a whole through the lid and bucket so he could chain it to a tree next to a large ant mound and in two weeks the ants had picked it completely clean.
Well i am smoking some bbq right now. I boiled the skull for a little bit at low temp but i took it off so i could bbq. I will put it back on the fire when i get done bbqing in about three more hours. I haven't boiled i t because i knew id burn the antlers hanging out of the pot. But im to the point of not caring. So i will just clean thwart main beams up when they get discolored. I am afraid to wrap them over an open fire.
I brought a nice hog's head back from Florida last fall, as I wanted the skull. I left it near my pond, hoping nature & the bugs would clean it off. The smell was, well, lets just say "quite ripe". Something large, dog, coyote or bear, took it. Gone. Note to self; next time... BOIL it!
I also use the boil, pick, peroxide, bleach method. Lots of work and looking for something much less hands on. Great thread!
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I tried the fire ant thing here in Alabama, did not work.
I simmer mine in a turkey fryer with Borox in the water. Works great and the Borox takes all the smell out. Just a light simmer. If you boil it, the teeth usually fall out.
Just about any method will cause the teeth to fall out at some point. Boiling makes the bone more brittle and nasal material will come out. I like detail and will not boil a skull. Masceration is my 2nd favorite method and it also works on the degreasing process as well, you will have teeth typically fall out doing this. They go back in quite easy. Beetles are my favorite and most hands off, so to speak. After taking them out of the beetles I just degrease them for however long they take.
When whitening a skull, DO NOT USE BLEACH. That will deteriorate the bone.
I use a couple of different things. IF you have a pool supply store, you can get baquacil oxidizer, it's 24% peroxide works well. I also have some 50% peroxide that I use as well. You can also go to the beauty supply store and get some volume 40 creme and basic white. The volume 40 is a 12% peroxide and the basic white is a developer/carrier. I mix that up, put it on the skull very liberally and wrap in saran wrap, put in front of a heat source. I put mine out on a glass table. If you put in front of heater of some sorts, be careful not to get it to close so the saran wrap doesn't melt.
If you need to replace teeth, you can use regular ol elmers glue. It dries clear and works well. I usually dilute the elmers and put it in a spray bottle with water. I then spray it on every skull. I'll use it to replace any teeth that have come out as well.
Once the skull is completely degreased (to your liking) and then whitened, I use a product called paraloid to seal them up. You can also use a Krylon matte finish sealer, found at hobby lobby to seal them. It works well also. Make sure to get the non-yellowing stuff.
I'll be happy to answer any questions or help, if you need it.
As I posted earlier, I soaked mine in water. Came out pretty good considering what it went through before I got it in the water.
Didnt skin it, laid on the floor in the garage all winter (was gonna take it to the "Bug Guy"), hung in a tree for a year, THEN I put it in the water. The rack got a little sun bleached. It wasnt a dark rack to begin with though.
Its never been whitened, this is how it came out of the water, I just sprayed it off. Its been done for 3 years, just took pics today.
Eric
(http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h121/mandoman_2006/P7140005.jpg)
(http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h121/mandoman_2006/P7140007.jpg)
I've always boiled them out- simmered is a better word probably. I also use some sal-soda in the pot that helps break up the tissue. It's also called sodium bicarbonate and you can get it cheap at taxidermy places. Simmer for an hour and pick off what you can- simmer again for 30 minutes and pick the rest clean- use hemostats and a bent piece of wire with the garden hose for the brain- then peroxide for the whitening- then the sun for a few hours to finish it up! I've done 30 or so this way with out any problems
Tim B
anyone else use the flies and maggots? im interested in this method and how good it cleans all the skin, tissue and brains out. also, what do you do after the maggots?
My buddy uses maggots, he hangs the skull wrapped in a plastic bag in a outbuilding then cuts a few slashes in the bag to allow the flies in. He says it's important that the skull doesn't dry out because the maggots won't eat dry meat. Makes sense to me and probably applies to ants also.
Oops, I KNEW this was going to happen to me. I should have found something to wrap the antlers with.
I was inside the cabin talking to my dad for too long and I didn't reposition the skull outside while it was boiling.
Well, the heat from the side of the pot came up and burned my antlers on the side sticking out of the pot.
It heated up the marrow and air pocket inside of the antler and cracked it open. Then while I was trying to scrub off the black burn mark the antler broke off.
so, it looks like I will break out some sandpaper and superglue...
If I weren't broke then I'd have had the thing mounted last year since it was my first archery deer. I had shot target archery since I was twelve but I never put out the extra effort to bow hunt seriously.
Oh well...another learning experience.
(http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e311/Blacktalons/BrokenBoil.jpg)
I wonder if pouring some RidX septic tank bacteria in a bucket of water would eat away the flesh and clean the skull up.
Anyone ever try it?
You can use bondo to put the antler back on and sad away the excess, carefully and also fill in any cracks. There are stains you can use to match the color back up.
Negative on the rid x, do not do that.
Here is my damage. It's pretty fragile around the break now. It's carbonized...there is no sanding that out.
I'll finish cleaning the skull and then this guy is going on the wall. I'm not going to bother with epoxy I don't think. If it breaks again then I will, but the superglue should suffice. Plus I'm in the middle of nowhere and I'm not making a special trip anywhere for epoxy.
This is what you get for leaving the antler hanging out of the pot exposed to high heat around the pot.
This season, if I get a small buck that I don't get mounted, I will just make myself a rotting barrel. I'll have holes in it to allow bugs to get in and eat the flesh as it rots. That's about as simple as it can get. No need in fighting mother nature.
(http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e311/Blacktalons/AntlerBurn2.jpg)
(http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e311/Blacktalons/AntlerBurn1.jpg)