Garic:

Salt is not necessary if you have cleaned and dried the hide properly. Salt will draw moisture out of the air for a long time. This can make your skin sorta clamy at times. If you must put something on a hide then use borax. The borax won't draw moisture from the air . Like I said, if the hide is scraped and cleaned properly you won't need anything on it to preserve it.

It will be stiff but that just makes it easy to work with. I have even glued tanned deer hide (premo strips) to cardboard to get the hide stiff enough to be easy to work with. I don't like tanned hides for a number of reasons but sometimes it is expediant to use them.

fishbum