cleaned and whitened my first skull

broncoo

broncoo

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small 3yr old spring blackbear its my first bear(was a nice brown color hide is at the tannery now)

i still have to glue the lower jaw back together and some of the teeth that fell out while boiling. any of you have a glue you would recommend

bearskull002.jpg

bearskull001.jpg
 
Skull looks great, what did you use for whitening?

I am going to do a Coyote skull for my first one and any tips are appreciated.

Have read that Elmers white glue works for the teeth.
 
The teeth almost always fall out, try to keep the water at a slight simmer rather than a boil, and look for teeth before you toss the water. When I'm done boiling and take all the crap out of the brain cavity and nose, I put the skull in an extra large freezer bag and dump in a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, and rotate every day for a about a week to make it white. if you don't remove all the cartilage and gunk, it will stink later on. I've done a lynx, a wolf, and a beaver in the last few months, still have a martin and a bear skull to do in the freezer.


That bear skull looks great. The younger ones may not be as big, but the teeth look much better.
 
The teeth always fall out on predators. Moose and deer not so much but it happens, I'd give each tooth a wiggle and glue if needed. That way you don't loose teeth later.
 
thanks guys, the process i used was to cut as much meat off before boiling, remove the brain first. then boiled on a light rolling boil for 5hrs. let cool overnight then clean the meat off. there was still a fair bit of cartilage on the skull, so i boiled for an additional 2hrs but this time added some palmolive and superclean degreaser to the water.

now that the skull was clean, i placed it and all the teeth in a tub and covered with 3% hydrogen peroxide, which i got from wallmart for $3 a litre. whitening was apparent after about 20min but i let it soak for 20hrs. i was happy with the results so out it came

now just need to do the glueing
 
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broncoo said:
thanks guys, the process i used was cut as much meat of before boiling, remove brian first. then boiled on a light rolling boil for 5hrs let cool overnight then cleaned meat off. there was still a fair bit of cartilage on the skull so i boiled for an additional 2hrs and this time added some palmolive and superclean degreaser to the water

now the skull was clean i placed it and all the teeth in a tub and covered with 3% hydrogen peroxide which i got from wallmart for $3 a litre. whitening was apparent after about 20min but i let it soak for 20hrs i was happy with the results so out it came

now just need to do the glueing
Click to expand...


How did Brian get in there and why did you remove him?;)
 
Good interesting thread!!! Fiddler, would you mind if I asked to post up some pics? I forget what car show I was watching on TV, but there was a skull that had been chromed.
 
Any reason to boil it as opposed to other options? I did a deer skull a few years ago, I left all the flesh, eyes, brains and tongue intact and just buried it in the front flower bed for about a year. When I pulled it out it was clean as a whistle. Next I put it on a fence post (where it still sits) and the sun bleached it.

Cool looking skull for sure. If I ever do get out bear hunting and get one, I'll be doing a skull mount on it as well.
 
darcy32171 said:
Good interesting thread!!! Fiddler, would you mind if I asked to post up some pics? I forget what car show I was watching on TV, but there was a skull that had been chromed.
Click to expand...

Dubya dubya dubya dot staceydavid dot com.

The show was an episode of gears, or at least the same thing was covered in any case.......

That's a real nice job there OP. I usually hire my work out as I'm too much of a puss to risk damaging a trophy........

Cheers!
 
Elmers glue, white glue also works on the bone. The glue dries clear and helps to stablize the bone. I've used it on whale bones and it looks fine. I've also used it on whale bone that was beginning to break down and it stablized the structure, looks good.
 
Not trying to be critical here fiddler--but that skull on the right ain't a lynx.

The skull looks good but time will tell--not saying it will but it might yellow with age.

There is a a three stage process to properly cleaning any skull.

1st--get the meat off--boiling,beetles or maceration--boiling (actually simmering) works as good as any.

2nd--degrease the skull--gotta get the fat outta the bone. Fairly easy on a cervid like deer--not so easy on a bear or worse yet a hog. Put the skull in a cooler with warm water and dawn dish soap. Don't use industrial degreasers as you will weaken the bone.

3rd--bleach the skull. All bleaches weaken the bone--some more than others. Chlorine bleach like Javex will turn bone into powder in very short order. Hydrogen Peroxide is much better--but you can over do it with that too. An important part of bleaching is the Sun. Soak it in Hydr Perx for an hour and then let it sit in bright sunlight for a couple of hours--it'll really brighten up.

Teeth are gonna fall out--as has been stated Elmers or Lepages white glue works fine to put them back in with.

I use to seal mine by watering down Elmers white glue and painting it on--not real happy with the results. Museums use a placitiszer called B-72--its a kind of plastic you melt and then paint on--don't know where you could get some--maybe on-line taxidermy supply houses.

If you find it yellowing on you after time you can always degrease again--I've had to do that with a couple of bear skulls.
 
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