Feather cleaning help

[dinorocks]

I have acquired a large bag of turkey feathers from my chicken breeder (he collected them for me after processing turkeys for Thanksgiving).  Lots of the feathers are matted and very dirty (looks like they were picked up from a very muddy floor after getting trampled on).  Does anyone have any suggestions on how best to clean them and "un-mat" them...i.e., get them ready for processing?

Thanks!

Dino

[moebow]

You may not get ground in dirt out of them but try this.  Steam the feathers and use a cheap 1" paint brush to brush dirt off them.  You will find that matted feathers really can come back to life in the steam, the dirt may be another matter.

[americanhunter7]

Put them in a zippered pillow case and hand wash with a small amount of liquid dish soap. Wash in a sink by gently agitating the pillow case with your hands for several minutes. Then empty dirty water and repeat till you are satisfied. Rinse thouroughly while still in the pillow case and then either toss in a dryer on low or no heat setting to dry, or lay them out on several paper towels to air dry then fluff with a hair dryer.

Where's Matt??? (magnus), or stringstretcher).....They'll have some great ideas I'm sure. Or you can PM either one of them to see how they do it.

[stringstretcher]

If these are domestic turkeys, good luck.  I have not figured out a way to get them 1) clean,2) un matted.  The domestic turkeys do not have the oil in the feathers that a natural turkey does.  I have done it like they said above, only to get a clean, messed up feather.  Wish I had the answer, but I have not figured it out yet.

[dinorocks]

Before I send these feathers to the mulch pile, does anyone else have any suggestions (I do plan to try washing and steaming a few of the primaries)?  These are domestic turkeys (but of an heirloom variety).

Thanks,
Dino