Neat, Panman!
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Neat, Panman!
I must have 20 duck skins that are all in great shape with all feathers on them. It is real easy to clean them if you are willing to do so. Just take a dull teaspoon and scrape the hide with it getting rid of the fat being careful not to rip the skin. When you have it all clean wash it in hot soapy water and then dry it out. Now wash it in white gas and dry it again and wash it again in the hot soapy water and you will have a very nice clean non-oily skin with feathers on. I do several at one time but you can do one at a time. Good to do when nothing else is going on. Freeze your skins if you are not going to do them right away. There you go. Ron
white gas...You mean the stuff for Coleman stove's and lantern's !?!?
you tell me now after I have plucked them and stuffed them into a pillow case!! Before washing them in the washing machine...hehe
The bad news is that my wife has found out, and threatening a divorce!!!!
Why wash it in gas?
I have a set of wings from a barn owl that was hit by a car. It appears from the condition of the bird, it was hit the night before. Instead of plucking all the feathers, I was thinking of hand washing/drying them? Will that work for preserving?
What is white gas?? Is that white spirits or some sort of cleaning alcohol??
Will that not remove most of the natural oils from the feathers or wings??
What RonMT said! I have many duck skins with feather attached. Using the spoon is a great trick. You can use a sharper knife or blade to scrape animal hides, but the bird skins are too thin and fragile. The spoon works nice. Once you have the fat off, they're simple to dry. I know quite a few guys who don't even go the distance with the white gas (Coleman lantern fuel), but simply wash in soapy water a few times (Dove dishwashing soap seems to work on the fats)and tack them to a board to dry. A dusting with borax finishes them up and keeps out the critters. The white gas is some additional insurance. Just my 2c . . .
Joe
JC is correct with the White Gas. Works great getting rid of the oil in the feathers. It also is good at keeping the bugs out. You will not believe how great a skin can look if taken care of in this fashion. I have some thaat you would swear the duck just took off his feathers and handed them to the guy and put on his spare one's http://www.flyanglersonline.com/bb/wink.gif
Folks are right Coleman Fuel = White Gas
Ron
I would be happy to take the skins off anyone who has plucked what they want off.
http://www.flyanglersonline.com/bb/smile.gif
Joe Fox
I have had great luck with Synthrapol. It's a detergent that's a great degreaser. I once soaked a raw mink hide in some water with a small amount of Sythrapol added. I couldn't believe how well it removed the mink fat. Stone River Outfitters carries it. Bill