whats the best way to do a euro mount?

[cackle]

find some one with beetles? or boil the skull?

[bucklucky]

Beatles or maceration (or rotting the meat in water), those are the best 2 ways to do a skull period. 

[scoyoc5]

bucklucky how long does it tak to soak it?

[bucklucky]

Michelle Nelson does the Maceration method, maybee she can shime in on this. I dont do it, I have beetles.

[bow4elk]

I soak skulls in water after completely removing as much tissue as possible.  It takes a a couple weeks but I change out the water when it gets really nasty.  I've also experimented with a loose plastic grocery sack tied around my bear skulls after soaking them for a couple days.  Put them outside in the shade and let the flys have at them.  The sack keeps the moisture in creating a gnarly, stanky greenhouse of maggot heaven!  After a week of that mess, you can pretty much hose them off and move onto degreasing.  Michelle has a detailed process.  HEY MICHELLE

[300rum]

Man..... Put'em in a pot and boil them for half a day, taking the head out and washing it off once in awhile.  Pull the cartilage out of the nose and scramble the brains out with a screw driver.  Let it dry for a couple of days and you don't have any stink or slime.  That rot in water thing doesn't sound too fun to me.  I like to leave the head natural after boiling it is not "fake" white and comes to a nice natural bone color.  The horns get a nice little patina on them also.  Make sure that the bases are out of the water if you want to save some bark that is stuck in their bases.

[Michelle_Nelson]

Boiling & Simmering flat out SUCK and you can ruin a skull quick doing it! Boiling can and will cause bone to break done especially with some of the chemical I've heard some people say they put in the watter.  It can also cause grease to set into the bone and cause discoloration

Maceration and beetles are the only way to go.  You will get far better results. 

Trim off the majority of the meat.  Scramble the brains and remove them.  Fill a 5 gallon bucket up with water.  Drop the skull in with a heater set at atleast 80 degrees.  Make sure the water covers the skull.  Let it set a week, than dump 2/3 of the water out and refill.  Do this every week till the skull is clean.  Should take 3 weeks. 

Than degrease it.  I start out wit a coupe weeks of dawn dish soap and water with a heater.   After the dawn rinse the skull and let it dry for a week to see if you have all the grease.  I usually finnish off with a week in acetone.  Bears have to be degreased with acetone.  Daw just wont cut all the grease.

One degreased let it dry a week and whiten the skull or seal as is.  Once whitened rince let dry and seal.

[bow4elk]

what do you whiten skulls with?  High % peroxide?

[Michelle_Nelson]

27% peroxide. 

[bowsandhose]

were do you get 27% peroxide?

[cackle]

well does anyone in the yakima area have some hungry beatles?

[Michelle_Nelson]

Pool Supply Store

[PolarBear]

I use 40% peroxide but you have to get it at a beauty supply.

[Michelle_Nelson]

Polar The hair supply stuff is actually ony 12% peroxide.  It says 40 volume but it's not 40%. 

[PolarBear]

Oops, my bad.  I should have known better, my wife is a hairdresser.    You get the 27% at the pool supply?  I'll have to try it.

[Michelle_Nelson]

Don't get it on you.  It doesn't wash off and will burn the *censored* out of you.  Usually 8 -12 hous is all you need.  Wicked stuff!

[bowsandhose]

thanks for the info 

[girlwithbow]

Ok how do ya get the brains out ?? anyone have a photo of what the underside of the skull is suppost to look like ??

[Michelle_Nelson]

Turn the skull upside down.  That's what it's supposed to look like. 

Get a stick or something along those lines.  Stick it up in that hole at the base of the skull and scramble the brains.  Them hose them out.  Sometimes I will get a coat hanger.  Cut about an 16" section out and bend it in half.  I than put the two ends in a drill and put it inside the brain cavity and really scramble the brains.  Then hose them out.  Comes out like pudding!

[bow4elk]

Real men then pour the puddin' in a tall tumbler and chug it down.  It's best luke warm after a couple days of rippening!!

[bucklucky]

Real men then pour the puddin' in a tall tumbler and chug it down.  It's best luke warm after a couple days of rippening!!

3

Dude, your gross 

[bow4elk]

getting late after a long day...

[Bean Counter]

What about just throwing it in the bushes beyond the yard? How long will it take for the ants, flies, and bugs to clean it allout?

[bow4elk]

too long...Michelle's technique is quickest.  It only take a few minutes with a stick and a hose.  keep your mouth closed during the hosing part...tends to spray back pretty good and I always seem to wind up dry heaving and spitting.

[Michelle_Nelson]

What about just throwing it in the bushes beyond the yard? How long will it take for the ants, flies, and bugs to clean it allout?

Well now that all depends.  If their are coons, cats, dogs, and possums to help clean it than not all that long.  Of course you also get to play the game of find whats left of my skull. 

[Michelle_Nelson]

Real men then pour the puddin' in a tall tumbler and chug it down.  It's best luke warm after a couple days of rippening!!

I've learned that if you leave it in the skull a week in a bag and than pull the brains out it looks like rice pudding once the maggots hatch. 

[Hunt4ever]

another thing you can do is use the new fake skulls... they are bullet proof and the look twice as good... and you dont have to mess with boiling or beetles...

[Michelle_Nelson]

Why use a fake skull when you can have the real thing.  The cost isn't going to be a whole lot different.

[270Shooter]

Real men then pour the puddin' in a tall tumbler and chug it down.  It's best luke warm after a couple days of rippening!!

Just kiddin 

[robb92]

I've done the boiling method and it worked good for me, took a while. Before I did it I researched it to read about the pros and cons of it, the bad thing about it is you can actually ruin the skull by boiling it to long and then it will fall apart. As far as the brains used the wife's fillet knife and she was not to happy about it but it worked really good, the nasal passages were another tricky thing, I used a piece of safety wire with a hook on the end and took my time so that I didn't break any bones.  I used peroxide to bleach the skull and sat it in the sun for an hour and repeated till I got the skull as white as I wanted. then I sprayed a clear coat over it.

[Michelle_Nelson]

Did you degrease it?

One thing I think I should mention is DO NOT use any kind of bleach to whiten a skull.  It will break the bone down and it will become chaulky and brittle.  I have had several skull come in from people that wanted me to try and save them.  Not a whole lot you can do with them.

[robb92]

yeah I used dawn dish soap with de-greaser in it. I used two cups of it to 5 gallons of water that I used while boiling. After it was done I rinsed it and the brushed it down with a paintbrush with dawn soap on it and repeated this 4 times and it was totally degreased.

[cohoho]

One thing I think I should mention is DO NOT use any kind of bleach to whiten a skull.  It will break the bone down and it will become chaulky and brittle. 

I learned the hard way with my first few bear skulls.  They looked really nice at first then about six weeks later started to see the flaks and parts fall off, they became extremely brittle and super light weight after a year, then got thrown away becuase they left crap everywhere, anytime you'd touch them...  I kept thinking it was due to boiling too long and didn't figure bleach till three skulls later...     So much for DYI.....  The new ones look good now...

[Michelle_Nelson]

yeah I used dawn dish soap with de-greaser in it. I used two cups of it to 5 gallons of water that I used while boiling. After it was done I rinsed it and the brushed it down with a paintbrush with dawn soap on it and repeated this 4 times and it was totally degreased.

Leave the skull out to dry.  Do not whiten it.  Let it set for a couple 2 - 3 weeks in the house and keep an eye on it.  Between the antlers and around the back part of the skull are the big grease areas on a skull.  You will see if ther is grease still in the skull after a few weeks.  If you see it seeping to the surface your gonna need to degrease it again.

[blacktail stalker]

Boiling & Simmering flat out SUCK and you can ruin a skull quick doing it!  Boiling can and will cause bone to break done especially with some of the chemical I've heard some people say they put in the watter.  It can also cause grease to set into the bone and cause discoloration

I have to disagree, I did mine and a buddies deer this year, using a post that had been on this site as a guide. Boiled on a propane burner, low and slow. Took about a day taking it out and cleaning all the flesh/brains etc. Let sit out and dry. Coated in a paste of peroxide and bleach for 24 hours. Took out hosed off and let dry. Both turned out awesome. Euro mount in 3 days. Nearly instant gratification.

I'm sure there are other ways that are less labor intensive. For me, spending a day out drinking some cold beer and boiling deer skulls is my happy place

[Michelle_Nelson]

Nearly instant gratification.

Disagree if you like but I have used Beetles, Maceration, and Boiling. 

Maceration and Beetles are the only way to go for great results!  Nearly instant gratification isn't always the best alternitive.
   

[julzzz]

I have a friend that puts his heads in an ant hill, then fences it off so the critters do not get to it.  ever heard of this?

[Michelle_Nelson]

Yeah I have heard of it.  It's done quite a bit.  The results will not be as good as a Beetle or Macerated skull.