Degreasing bear skulls

[troyspinetar]

I have two skulls that have been degreasing in a bucket of water with "dawn" dish soap. Been going for almost one month. Both look okay except some areas under neath and around the eye sockets. I am using a fish tank heater that is maxed out around 85-90 degrees. The water is being changed about every week.
Question for those with more experience, shall I continue on with same method or switch gears? I'm a little concerned that maybe my temp isn't warm enough. Not sure though.
Thanks.

[dreadi]

 Are you trying to make a European mount?

[blindluck]

you may not ever get it totally degreased if your temp is that low, you need 115-120 to really be effective in my experience. if you have a Aqueon heater with the blue temp control knob on top you can pull the knob and over crank it and get it to heat up to those higher temps. I have a cow moose and a deer degreasing right now at 120. Also bears seem to take longer up to several months depending on the skull.

[buglebuster]

I've got 5 degreasing right now. Get yoursf a bucket safe from chemicals it will say something like HDPE on it. I use the orange ones from home depot with a lid. Fill it with 3 gallons if acetone and let it sit for a month. Make sure its sealed, and in a safe place.

[troyspinetar]

Yep...euros is the goal. I did the maceration method. Man that works good, but wholly crap I did not prepare myself for the stink!
I thought my temp was a bit low. The heater I have is Aquatop 150 watt. It worked good for heating the stew but not so much for degreasing.
Thanks for the tips.

[buglebuster]

Yep I macerate too. Right into 2 or 3 days of blue dawn and water to remove smell, then a month in acetone 

[Smossy]

Makes me miss my beetles </3 So much more efficient than maceration.

[buglebuster]

Makes me miss my beetles </3 So much more efficient than maceration.

I disagree. When using Beatles you end up with all the grease in the skull, therefore making it harder to degrease. Using maceration is actually pulling alot of the grease out in the process. Not to mention keeping your Beatles alive, and dealing with freezing the skulls to kill parasites.

[troyspinetar]

Is the acetone harsh on the skull? Any adverse effects or smell?

[buglebuster]

Is the acetone harsh on the skull? Any adverse effects or smell?

No and no 

[BlackRiverTaxidermy]

troyspinetar,
You need the temp higher than 90 degrees. Bears will take much longer than a month to fully get the grease out with several baths in acetone. Heres what I do for bears that have taken a lot of trial and error over some time of playing around with several methods...of course I have bugs clean the skull first but the rest is as follows....
1. put skulls in 120 degrees water in a bucket of water, 1/4 cup of Dawn Dishwashing soap, 1/4 cup per 5 gallons. Ive found the 'Power Clean' (blue) works really well. Don't use knock-off imitation soaps...they simply don't work as well.
2. change the water out at least once a week, the first week of degreasing you will most likely have to change the water in the first 3 days as a ton of grease will come out initially.
3. at the 1 month mark take the skull and lower jaw out, the teeth will have fallen out by now and possibly the lower jaw mandibles have separated, and put in an acetone bath at room temp for 24-48 hours...no need to add the teeth. **make sure to rinse the skull before adding back to the Dawn dishwashing bath.
4. keep in Dawn dishwashing bath for an additional month. Remove and let dry...the skull will be a yellowish tint overall but if there is still grease in the skull it will appear, most likely behind the eye sockets and back of skull. If it appears give another acetone bath and then another 2 weeks in Dawn. If not, glue in all the teeth and proceed to your whitening steps. ****DO NOT add any hydrogen peroxide to the Dawn bath...the heat coupled with the peroxide swells the teeth and eats the finer nasal bones out...this information comes doing this once and never again!!

The bigger the skull the longer it will take to degrease. Best of luck!
Joel- BlackRiver Taxidermy.

[buglebuster]

Thanks for that info. Good stuff!

[troyspinetar]

Great tips...thanks!

[klickman]

I have a bear skull that is showing signs of grease. Yellow around the eyes and coloration on back of skull. I suspect it didn't get degreased completely. Would an acetone bath work to clean this up? 


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[Eric M]

tag

[BlackRiverTaxidermy]

klickman,
It will help but you will truly need to put it into a hot water bath for at least a couple of weeks to fully get it out. Here's the misnomer with acetone...it works really well to remove surface grease or thin boned animals such as the skull of a deer or small mammals but to get grease out of thick bone like a bear or elk you really need to heat the bone up with hot water. This process swells the bone and makes it more porrus, thus allowing the grease to be brought out by Dawn soap. That's why a good month in hot water THEN put into acetone removes grease really well; with the swelled bone the acetone gets into the tough spots and dissolves the grease, but this cant be done unless its porrus via the water bath. Acetone just itself will not fully degrease large bones/skulls in my experience but its invaluable coupled with hot water baths.
Hope this helped.
Joel- BRT

[klickman]

Thanks for the tip. I will do this.


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