I just got done fleshing my first two coons ever. And I noticed
when you get the muscle and all the easy fat off. Then your left
with that layer of fat that is tight to the hide. Are you done fleshing or do you take that off also. Because I left most of it on the belly, I saw some hair come through in places were i took that layer off. And I know that's not a good sign. Do you guy's leave that on or take that off. I think that it would be better on than off so not to cut the hair, i think they will take it down to were they want it after tanning right.

Helps if you have a good sharp fleshing knife. When you have a sharp edged knife, you don't have to push as hard thats what usually causes those hair roots exposed.

Thank you sniperbbb i was wondering how sharp to make my knife.
shaven sharp or hold back a little what would you suggest.

Does your knife have 2 edges?

One edge should be dull and the other should be very sharp.

what i have is the 8" knife that everbody has for sale in the catalog's one edge is sharp and the other is flat but could be made into a dull edge

Sniperbbb would you mind if i sent you a PM

If its what I am thinking it is, I would not sharpen it as it is the wrong shape for the sharp edge. I would invest in a necker or sheffield knife. It will make your furhandling much easier.

Trust me, I have the slightly larger version of what your using. When beaver season comes in, you will regret not having a good knife, its a pain the behind to say the least to scrape a beaver with that kind of knife.

I had a feeling you was going to say that. I was being a tight&%?
when I bought that knife. LOL

sure go ahead

I'am just learning and getting started in this great sport. My oldest girl was with me today we got one male about 25 or 30lbs we had a great time this morning and skining and fleshing him and one other from a couple days ago.

do most of you guys perfer to just push the fat off or shave it off?

Doctor -

I had the same knife as you earlier this season. After my 2nd coon, I ordered a knecker and never looked back. Huge diff!!!

Buy the Blue English system. It comes with everything you need and has a great instuction book.

I just read another post from today about fleshing grinners and someone said to wrap a towel around the beam to keep from pulling hairs through the pelt,it's worth a try.

Unless you or an expert scraper, I don't think I would sharpen any knife to a razor edge for coon.
A coon scraping knife has one area that is fairly sharp and the rest of the knife is fairly dull.
you must take off all the membrane and gristle off of the coonhide.
You should actually start scraping your coon on the side of the coon up by the ears. When you do this , you will be scraping some of the belly and some of the back at the same time. The reason you are seeing hairs pull through the hide is because you are scraping over the same spot to many times.
you want to make your first cuts get below the gristle and fat , down to the leather.
Once you have got to that point just keep the fat and gristle running down the hide in a straight line. If you keep comming back over the same spots you thin and stretch the leather and cause the hair roots to come through.
Once you have that run of gristle off the hide , you then bring your knife up to the head area again and start your next cut right next to the cut you just made.
Do both sides of the coon then do the strip that is left on the belly and then do the strip that is left on the back last.
If you have to you can take a sharp knife and kinda score the area you want to start at. When you do this , just cut deep enough to see the leather then do not cut any deeper withe your knife. Once you have a slice made it is a lot easier for a beginner to start the scraping process.
Also once you have gotten to the leather, make sure you do not keep running your scraping knife over and over the same piece of clean leather. This will cause a coon to have hair on both sides of the pelt. I call these reversable coons.

The hair pulling on a oppusumn is caused by the same thing that hair pulling on a coon is caused from. Only thing , a opposumn is a lot thinner and it is a lot easier to cause hair pulling.
I use a pretty sharp knife when I scrape oppusumn. the reason for it is, the oppusumn hide stretches very easy. I also most generally scrape the lower part of my op. before i scrape the upper hald. reason for this is, op. have a very gristley throat and neck on them. By scrapping the lower part first, that leaves the fat and gristle on the upper part to support the hide a bit.

I also say no rags under any pelts. If a rag bunches up and it will, then you have a hole in the pelt.
Back about 100 yrs. ago I used to pad my beam with carpetting. The carpett kept wearing out so I bought heavy thick stiff rubber convaor belt and used that. It was ok, but like the carpet, it did not stay around long. Both items had to much give to them when the scraping knife was working on the pelt. Them about 90 yrs ago I went to all wood beams again. Nice hard contact, you can feel the leather better and you can control your cut better.

One other thing about scraping op. I have seen thousands of op ruined by people scraping to hard on the neck area of a op. This causes stretching and causes the underfur and guardhair to fall out in big patches. Once again, when I scrape op. I use my beaver knife that is very sharp. It will take a lot of practice to be able to scrape the neck and throat of a op, but in time you will be able to do it.

I just got done with two more coon,s and I have another on the beam ready to go. Thing's are working out alot better and I think it's just going to take somemore time in the saddle. These last two coon look a whole lot better than the first two.