I've got a beaver skull and a coon baculum macerating in a bucket of water outside. I am not using any supplementary heat, but changing water every 4 days or so.
When do I add degreaser? What should I use if I don't plan to simmer/boil?

Ant hill might be quicker, your degreasing meat never heard of it?

Degreasing the skull. Apparently it won't get white or will get yellow blotches if you don't.
Never done this before, so I figure it might make sense to ask on here.
No anthills around me to try.

You would think you could bleach it white once you got the meat off of it, you ever hear of them beetles that clean skulls they ear the meat but not any cartilage.

Need to degrease, my friend used simple green in warm water

Rittles degreaser. The stuff used for pelts and bear hides. Check for it with trap supply houses or direct from Rittles. Degrease is a step before whitening. Very important step.

It takes time without heat, and maybe a few different soaks. Keep at it until nothing is settling out. Don’t make your mix too strong or the freeze will have a hard time going out. Seems counterintuitive.

Don’t use bleach to whiten, it eats the bone. Use hydrogen peroxide. The over-the-counter stuff (3%) works fine and is less than a buck a quart. Works best if UV light (like sunlight) is hitting it. So use a clear container and set in a window for a few days.

Don’t rush skulls.

do you guys glue teeth in place an when do you do it

I use TANNERY DEGREASER that I get from McKenzie Taxidermy Supply. Penetrates very well and a little goes a long way. mckenziesp.com code# TDQ

Unleaded gasoline from the pump. Dont be stoopid with sparks follow all common sense thoughts about not ending up in a burnward.

seriously though done all kinds of hides and skulls with unleaded it will pull the grease eezypeezy

J

And smart not to use heat on you skulls,

X2

For teeth, I use superglue. just put a small dab on all of them at the base where it enters the bone. It will go into the socket and hold it tight. Do them all. Turn the skull upside down so that gravity pulls the glue down into the socket. Do the jaw separate.

I did a deer skull with peroxide once. Turned out just fine. Takes a long time. Sunlight helps too.

A day or two in 3% peroxide will do just fine, then wash in a foamy dawn soap and sit in the sun for a day and it should be fine

Thanks folks. I'll upload a pic if it turns out

After simple green bath, he would mix a peroxide, magnizium paste on skull, then brush off when dry

I used to own M.O.A Custom skulls. I was doing 300+ black bear skulls a year, plus virtually every other animal in North America and Africa. I used Dermestid beetles to clean them. I had 5 colonies that each would clean a deer/bear sized skull in /4-36 hrs. I had 12, 20cubic foot freezers to keep skulls in to be cleaned.

That said cold water maceration will result in a better looking skull. For various reasons I did many skulls by this method. Often Buffalo skulls because of their size. Even though I had hugely populated colonies that could consume the flesh off of smaller skulls quickly, they could not clean buffalo skulls most times before spoilage. I had to keep the building I housed the colonies in at 80 degrees year around. I had automatic ventilation system on each colony, which helped with spoilage somewhat. Dermestids will eat dried meat but it slows them down, so the skulls went in non-dried.

Cold water maceration does get foul smelling when the skull is removed. However, being submerged in water does help remove some grease from the skull whereas beetles do not.

Now to remove the grease from all skulls (wild boar and bear being the worse), I immersed larger skulls and horned animals
In a 4 foot square metal tank I had made with a rubber gasket seal for the lid. In this tank was acetone. I kept the seperate building with this tank at about 70 degrees to speed the degreasing. I bought acetone in 55 gal drums. It became so polluted with fats and oils over time it had to be dsgarded.

For bear and smaller skulls I used 5 gallon buckets with rubber sealed lids to degrease skulls.

For your beaver skull you can use an empty cottage cheese container with the snap on lid.

For all skulls I left them in for 7 days to degrease. I put all skulls in each container at the same time and removed them at the same time.

Now for whitening never, ever use bleach!!!!!!!

Use Hydrogen Peroxide. And not the 3% you buy in stores. I used 36%. Nasty stuff! Burn your skin in seconds. I bought mine in 55 gal. drums as well.

Soooooo, obviously you don’t need that much or that much strength.

Go to a pool and spa place. Buy a gallon of clarifier for pools. BE SURE IT IS NOT BLEACH BASED!!!!! Tell them you want the hydrogen peroxide based. One brand name is Bauquacil, another is Soft Swim. It is 27.5% hydrogen peroxide.

Place your skull in any PLASTIC CONTAINER ONLY! Needs no lid. For beaver about 36 hours. Take it out and place in direct light until dry. Teeth fall out and jaws separate. Use super glue.

Before gluing back together let the skull set in a warm place to see if grease spots appear. If they do place back in acetone.

Both the acetone and peroxide can be re-used. Keep the peroxide out of direct light and huge temp. changes or it will lose strength.

Sorry for the long email. Hope it helped

Steve

You know your stuff, my friend had a business in Gillette did skulls a few years, he used the 35% peroxide too

If a guy wanted to clean some snapping turtle skulls? What would be the best process? I assume that skinning would be first? But what about the next steps? Thanks

Everything the same as I stated above.

To cold wayer macerate, merely submerge the skull in water. Use stagnant or creek water.

All skulls should be skinned for less mess and time. Remove as much flesh as you can.

Horned skulls won’t begin to float when decompensation begins. Most others will. Use a rock etc. to hold them down.place the skulls upside down in the water.

Normally flies will buzz the waters edge and horns of animals. Almost never do they lay egs.

However ALL FLESH MUST BE SUBMERGED TO ABOID FLIES.

Small non-horned skulls can be submerged in a container with a lid.

Once all flesh has fallen off rinse off and plot in the acetone metioned in my other post.

Then submerge in the peroxide. I forgot to mention earlier to place all non-horned skulls upside down so no air pocket form in the brain cavity.

TO avoid the air pocket in horned animals drill a 1/8” or less hole at the peak of the ridge between the horns.

Anything used in holding down skulls in peroxide cannot be metal.

Good luck.

If anyone wants more info PM me.

Stee

Wow, very generous of you to offer so much knowledge Steve! Thanks!
I checked on things today...lots of meat left but it's definitely progressing. Looks like another week at least LOL...I am very impatient to See this through