velvet mounts

brybenn

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Not that this applys to me as my season for deer is Oct -dec. But how do you guys treat velvet antlers for mounting I've always been curious. My southern friends just toss them
 
Freeze dry is how most taxidermists do it I believe if you want to retain the velvet. Keep them in the freezer until you get them to a taxidermist. If you just hang them, the velvet will peel and discolor and it looks like crap very shortly.

If the velvet is beginning to come off, like with caribou at times during the beginning of the hunting season, I've just peeled it off and thrown the antlers in a river/lake for a while, it seems to get rid of the blood. They come out white, so you have to stain it to make it look like normal hard antler, it's not too difficult. Some use a glossy varnish stain, which I don't like, but that's personal preference. I don't really like mounted velvet antlers either, but again, personal preference.
 
The neighbour had two sets of caribou antlers done up. They look nice, it takes a fair amount of time for the taxidermist to properly freeze dry them if I recall correctly.
 
From what ive read, you can inject something into the velvet with a syringe and it preserves it. My uncle had a friend who did it a couple times. It is something common, wish i could think of it right now.

It's called Formalin, formerly known as formaldehyde. My big velvet caribou in my avatar was flown from Dawson to Whitehorse to get it to my taxidermist within 18 hours of the kill time, he then injected them with the juice and preserved them beautifully, only one small section on the inside of one shovel shed it's velvet but is almost unnoticeable and I was very happy with the overall outcome.

 
From what ive read, you can inject something into the velvet with a syringe and it preserves it. My uncle had a friend who did it a couple times. It is something common, wish i could think of it right now.

Formaldehyde lots of it too.
And a good supply of sharps to do the job.
Not many guys do it, unless they are going after a trophy.
One of the guys at Richmond Rod and Gun has several or shall I say had them on display in the Club House.
They lasted many years, but again to each their own.
Rob
 
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Thanks
The only velvet deer I've got was with my truck. One antler thru the rad the other was bout 150' behind the place of impact
Neither were in good condition after impact.
 
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