I am wondering if you guys can help me figure out why I am getting an orange tint on the strips of my skunks after I am putting them up. They seem to have nice white strips when I skin them, I use the baking soda, Peroxide, dish soap mixture to descent them and I try to rinse them thoroughly. I try to dry them before freezing them but they don't always/rarely get completely dry. I am freezing them in ziploc bags so that the wet fur doesn't stick to my other fur. After I unthaw, flesh them, and stretch them, The tips of the hairs in the strips are getting stained an orangish color. I put together this YouTube video below showing what is going on. I did try Dawn dish soap this year and I had some of the same issue. Any thoughts on what I can do differently to prevent this from happening is greatly appreciated. I just want to say that I rarely have the time the day I catch them to get them put up but if that is what is causing it, I may need to find the time.

https://youtu.be/sF9C_lF6z5s

Schmattz

Learn how to get them without spraying and needing to decent them. My guess I’d the decent mix might be doing it. Here in the wet years the stripes get that orange tint to them dry years not so much.

I'm guessing the freezing is doing that, although I couldn't explain why. I use the 3 part mixture sometimes when I catch a skunk in a body grip that lets loose. I rinse the mixture off and then put them in front of a fan to dry and flesh/board after. I've never frozen one and haven't had the staining issue you are showing. I wonder if the orange will come out during the tanning process?

I watched the vid.I think when you wash them some grease,dirt or residual soap is getting left in the fur and shows up in the white.
Just skin,scrape and freeze them or put them up.
Washing any kind of fur before putting it up is generally a bad idea and not necessary unless the animal was rolling in mud or greasy bait.
On the positive side,it will most likely come out in the tanning.

Late season skunks often have an orange tinge to the white, strippers and spotted.

They were pure white on the carcassl No stain,

Just a guess it may be the strength of your Peroxide. The Peroxide in ladies hair die , commercial, medical,etc ,varies and time in the solution may also have a difference. I think the formula was for 3% ?

Easy experiment......ditch the Orange dish soap and see if you still get the staining.

I have the yellowish to orange staining on the majority of my skunks but that is as caught due to mineral staining from our red clay soils. I use the same formula that the OP uses except I use Dawn Blue dish soap if I need to descent. The formula will not remove the mineral stain but it does clean the surface dirt off and actually makes the black fur and the stripes look brighter. I also skin and freeze but not until they are dry so they do not freeze together. I have never seen any noticeable difference in appearance before versus after freezing.

I would guess it is the peroxide or iron in the water.

I'm thinking it's the die in the soap.

Hydrogen peroxide does not play well with ferrous metals so iron in the rinse water could possibly be reacting with the peroxide but the picture posted by the OP appear to be pretty extreme for drug store strength peroxide to do that. Stronger peroxide has a severe reaction to a tiny bit of exposure to a ferrous metal. Just a spec of rust will cause strong peroxide to boil.