Hunting & Fishing Boiling A Skull........

[Tripwire]

Gonna try one and see what happens.

Heard/Read somewhere it goes better adding something to the water.

Faster results, cleaner skull, etc.

Can't recall where I saw it, or what it was.

Any concensus here?

 

[skinney_7]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

sodium (soda) ash, is what you need.

 

[Sendero_Man]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

bizz bleach. non chlorine !

you use chlorine, it will eat the bone !

change the water often, get all the fat off pre-boil

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I remember now...

Saw a vid a while back on The Buck Boiler, electric unit, add 1/2 ounce "powdered dishwashing detergent".

 

[whitetailnut]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: skinney</div><div class="ubbcode-body">sodium (soda) ash, is what you need. </div></div>

+100

http://www.mckenziesp.com/Search.aspx?k=soda+ash

 

[veezer]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

you can find soda locally at pool supply places and even lowes in their pool section. Make sure you get sodium carbonate, not bicarbonate. Mix it 1/4 cup to 1 gallon water and boil away.

After you boil off all the meat and fat, a soak in peroxide for a few minutes (up to 10) will whiten the skull... just dont leave it in there too long.

 

[Jered Joplin]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I've used just water before and it worked fine. I'll have to try the soda. I always bleached it with a brush when it was done to whiten it. Then rinsed it and sealed it with a lacquer .

 

[redirt78]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Tagged this so I can save a few $'s next time. Thanks

 

[wyosniper]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I have boiled out over 100 heads of all kinds. All you need is a carpet knife, turkey fryer, dish soap.Boil up your water with dish soap, while you skin the head out. when its a rolling boil drop it in. I use wire to hold its horns out. If you got access to a power washer it speeds the process up. It takes time, but just keep picking the meat off and boiling it.

 

[Jon Lester]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Pressure washer is worth good money for this task. Boil Skull then pressure wash all the meat away.

 

[RemingtonSPS]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I tried it for the first time last year. I cut the back half of the skull off to remove the nasties and ease of skinning. Pre-boiled, skinned, boiled again. Fairly easy just takes time. After i got it clean and dry i sprayed it and wiped it down with a mild bleach counter cleaner to kill the smell. I think it turned out well.

 

[whitetailnut]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I don't do many of these nowdays but I've done quite a few myself. I found that if you're constantly taking the skull in and out of the pot you're just adding time. Bring the water to a simmer ,add your detergent, soda ash, whatever and let it cook for at least 2 1/2 hrs. Let the chemicals do their thing. Just come thru and check you water level every so often, you don't want the skull touching the bottom of the pot.

As for when your deer head stew is done. Find a local beauty supply store and buy the stuff used to lighten hair.

http://www.sallybeauty.com/40-Volume-Developer/SLNCAR67,default,pd.html

http://www.sallybeauty.com/50-volume-developer/SBS-760637,default,pd.html

The creme will stay on the skull and not run off and evaporate.

Take the skull brush the creme all over it. Be careful not to get it on the antlers. Next wrap it in plain white paper towels and spray the towels down with the liquid developer. Stick everything in a black trash bag,tape it real tight so it looks like a deer skull taped up in a black trash bag. Let it sit for 2 weeks. Remove trash bag, paper towels and rinse. Then sit it out in the sun for a couple hrs.

 

[kill_goose]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I prefer the anearobic water method.

Basically just cover the skull with water, put the whole bucket in a black contractors bag out in direct sunlight for a week (preferably when its REALLY hot out), and let it "cook".

After a week, dump it out, scrape what you can off the skull, hose it all off and repeat it another week.

Uses anearobic bacteria to clean it up, no mess, no fuss, no flies, and keeps the "stink" to a minimum. And yields a great product.

 

[nfoley]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Find someone that has the beetles. Comes out looking REALLY nice. Have boiled a ton of skulls but every since discovering the beetles will never go back. Down here in tucson it will cost you about $75, depending on species of course.

 

[FALex]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

so you use peroxide to whiten the skull once all the meat is off? Bleach would not be good for this?

 

[fw707]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Nope, bleach will dissolve the bone.
Check the taxidermy supply places like McKenzie or WASCO for do-it-yourself kits.

 

[nfoley]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

you are correct about hydrogen peroxide after getting the skull clean to whiten. I used to soak in hydrogen peroxide for about 1-2 days, checking often.

 

[mb198]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Boil it outside in a turkey fryer if you can to minimize stinking up the house, especially if it's been a few months since you killed it.

 

[oldgrayone]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Jeffrey Dahmer.com will get you the answers you seek.

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: MB198</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Boil it outside in a turkey fryer if you can to minimize stinking up the house, especially if it's been a few months since you killed it. </div></div>

Few months?

Laffin'....killed November '09.

Been in a freezer ever since.

Was gonna have a dude at work mount it for me, but we had a, well, a "falling out" over it....and he told me to come get the damn thing or it was going in the trash.

Fine by me, his f'n loss, not mine.........

 

[UgashikBob]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Moose skulls are a special challange:

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Been out there slow cookin' since I posted that pic...so about 7 hours so far.

Pulled it, sprayed it down with a hose.....picked and poked some gunk/brains with a metal wire hook.

I'd say about 85% done....what's clean is as clean as it's gonna get, with still some internal nasal tissue/brain tissue still attached.

Renewed the water/soap and back in to cook some more........

 

[whitetailnut]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

2.5 hrs with soda ash, straight from the pot and dried.

 

[Tim Neitzke]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Alittle messy, but an air compressor with a blowgun works well. Blows out all the little stuff here and there and everywhere ! LOL

 

[mb198]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

There's a lot more in nasal cavity than you'd think, if you don't get it all it may give the house a small lingering odor.

 

[427Cobra]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Fire Ant mounds do just fine

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Let it cook a while longer last night, then took it to the sink and worked on it with a toothbrush, steak knife, and hot water. Getting the ear bones pried out made getting the back of the skull clean easy. Had one strip of cartilage in the center of the nasal cavity that was a little stubborn but after the second cooking it slipped right out. Good and clean now.

Thinking it turned out pretty nice. I'll prolly go on and see if the hydrogen peroxide will whiten the bone some more but really, it looks good now.

I'll be doing this again.........

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Here's a "before" pic, in case anyone cares....

FWIW...I used about half a cup of Cascade dishwasher powder in each cooking. Was all we had laying around here. The cooking wasn't a rolling boil because the pot cooker on the side of my grill didn't get hot enough to roll it...that, and it was cold enough here to spit snow yesterday. So it was mainly a slow simmer. I'll admit I didn't clean the skull beyond peeling the hide and scraping off as much meat as I could care to get. It did set in a five gallon pail of water for almost a week before I cooked it, so stuff was prolly gooey to start with.

 

[UgashikBob]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

TW:
For the skulls I processed I brought it to a very light boil untill the teeth were just about ready to fall out. A couple times I even had to super glue them in. I've found less risk just bleaching them in the sun.

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Noticed as I was working it in the sink last night that the teeth were sorta loose, and that the two halves of the upper skull were loose in the center, "growth plates"?

Though maybe I f'd up cooking it too long but this morning when it was dry everything was back to being a lot tighter.

Super Glue, if I need it.......

 

[coldboremiracle]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I,ve tried the stinky methood, and the chemicals. The best/easiest way I found is to boil and clean em till your satisfied, and then I just paint the whole skull with flat white. Seals in the stink and looks great too.

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

"Stink" mentioned several times here so far....

Honestly, the thing sits out there in the dining room and noone here can smell a thing.

My boxer isn't even paying it any attention.....

 

[elkhuntinguide]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: coldboremiracle</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I,ve tried the stinky methood, and the chemicals. The best/easiest way I found is to boil and clean em till your satisfied, and then I just paint the whole skull with flat white. Seals in the stink and looks great too. </div></div>

I've also heard of using white Elmers Glue and brushing it on to whiten and seal the skull...

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Pretty sure white elmers glue dries clear, so it probably wouldn't do much for whitening it. As far as sealing it, it might work but "dried" white elmers glue isn't very hard.

Think I'll look into some sort of varnish or poly that won't yellow with age, instead......

 

[xdeano]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

something that i've always done with the antlers is tape up the bases so the water doesn't bleach them out. I notice in the pic that the antlers without the tape around the base will leave a water mark plain as day.

The tape will basically eliminate that water mark. But if you do have the water mark at the base, a little bit of stain on a cloth and you'll be back to brown pretty quick. Just don't use to much.

xdeano

 

[Insayn]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 427Cobra</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Fire Ant mounds do just fine </div></div>

LOL...I bet they do.

 

[Forager]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Nice...

 

[kskevin]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

tag

 

[threetrees]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

what works fine for me:
- skin the head and remove as much as possible (eyes, tongue, etc)
- put it into a pot of water. neither antlers (bone) nor antlers (horn) should be in the water. add washing powder.
- cook mildly. bubbles are fine, but it shouldn't splash too much water on the trophy.
- use a knife and similar tools to get rid of the rest of skin/meat.

if it has horns you can make use of the hot bone now. usually the tissue/skin between horn and 'end journal' (is that the right translation?) is warm and soft now. try to turn the horn in its socket. after some trying the horn will go off. now you can strip off the rest of the skin under the horn (just scratch it off with a knife). to get it back on the skull i just use a few drops of superglue on the 'end journal'

for antlers - it's bone. nothing to do there.

finally: get some hydrogen peroxid (you can probably get it from any pharmacy). use a brush (old, clean paint brush will do) to apply the peroxid to the skull. put it into the sun and the peroxid will make the bone white as fresh snow. if it's too cold (like when you get a chamois in decembre), use a hair drier or similar. [ps: whatever the peroxide touches will be bleached. including your sprayed fingers/cloth. be careful with that stuff - wear glasses]

in total, takes a good afternoon to skin, cook, bleach.

no smell and a bleached-paperwhite bone/trophy

pps: if the antlers got bleached a bit during cooking or with bits of peroxide, you can use tree gum to get the old/similar colour back.

pps:
seeing that our local special terms for deer/hunting don't show up in any dictionary:
- what do you call antlers made of horn?
- what do you call antlers made of bone?
- what's the correct term for the bone on which horn grows/rests?
- how do you call it when deer rubs its (still skin covered) antlers against trees/bushes in late spring?

 

[TheLegend]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Antlers are not true horns. When fully developed, antlers are dead bone without a horn or skin covering; they are borne only by adults (usually males) and are shed and regrown each year.

Horns are growths of bone with a keratin covering. Horns start to grow soon after birth, and continue to grow throughout the life of the animal (except in pronghorns, which shed the outer layer annually, but retain the bony core).

The pedicle is the bone that antlers grow out of.

A tree that has been scraped with the antlers in the early fall we call a "buck rub" and the act is referred to as "rubbing out" or "rubbing".

 

[threetrees]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Bo Beaver</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Antlers are not true horns. When fully developed, antlers are dead bone without a horn or skin covering; they are borne only by adults (usually males) and are shed and regrown each year.</div></div> there can be abnormities when also females grow antlers ... it's rare though.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Bo Beaver</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Horns are growths of bone with a keratin covering. Horns start to grow soon after birth, and continue to grow throughout the life of the animal (except in pronghorns, which shed the outer layer annually, but retain the bony core).</div></div> jup. how do you call that piece of bone? because the pedicle (which you refer to further down) would be something else for us - the point antlers start to grow at and which is also the point where bone breaks off in early spring (actually those are bone-eating cells that result in the antler breaking off).

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Bo Beaver</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The pedicle is the bone that antlers grow out of.</div></div>

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Bo Beaver</div><div class="ubbcode-body">A tree that has been scraped with the antlers in the early fall we call a "buck rub" and the act is referred to as "rubbing out" or "rubbing". </div></div>

thanks for those two translations.

 

[rcnpthfndr]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 427Cobra</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Fire Ant mounds do just fine </div></div>

yes they do, but in the end i sun bleached the shit out of two huge blacktail racks i found locked up

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: threetrees</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Bo Beaver</div><div class="ubbcode-body">A tree that has been scraped with the antlers in the early fall we call a "buck rub" and the act is referred to as "rubbing out" or "rubbing". </div></div>

thanks for those two translations. </div></div>

Not so fast.....damnyankees call that a "buck rub".

Southerners correctly call it, a hornin'............

 

[mark42quin]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Excellent advice fellas.... If I may ad one more method...

Wrap freshly skinned out skull air tight with plastic bag, put it somewhere the dogs and sun can't get it, (I use an old metal shed), and let it rot! for a long time, I now freeze the heads I want done and rot them in the summer. When you pull it out of the bag, there should be nothing left but "liquid" in the bag and stink. One boil for about 10 minutes in Dawn dish soap and let it dry outdoors for a day... I've used paint and/or peroxide cream to whiten. It is REALLY easy! Just stinks a little

 

[Optimax90]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

I have a colony of beetles and that is the way to go... they eat every thing in every nook and crany and you don't have to watch them or change water or nothing..... All my skulls turn out really good!

 

[xdeano]

Re: Boiling A Skull........

Just helped a buddy boil out two heads locked together this after noon. We used the sodium carbonate crystals and it works like a charm.

xdeano