Taxidermy and Zoological Collecting / A Complete Handbook for the Amateur Taxidermist, Collector, Osteologist, Museum-Builder, Sportsman, and Traveller

by William T. Hornaday; W. J. Holland

2. Never slit the skin open along the under side of the throat. Cut it open in a straight line along the back of the neck, all the way along, up to a point midway between the ears. From that point run two cuts like the arms of a Y, one to the base of each antler or horn, as seen in Fig. 7. Run the point of the knife close around the base of each antler, and cut through the skin all the way.

3. Begin at the back of the neck, and skin downward on each side until the entire neck is free. As you proceed you will presently come to the ear, which stands up like a tree-trunk covered with bark. Cut the ear off close to the skull, leave it for the present just as it is, and go right on down toward the cheeks and throat, as far as you can go.

4. Begin next at the angle of the Y, on the top of the head, and skin down between the antlers and over the forehead until you reach the eye. Now proceed carefully. In many ruminants there is a deep cavity in the bone directly in front of the anterior corner of the eye, called an "eye-pit." The skin lines this eye-pit quite down to the bottom. Do not cut through the skin, but get down to the very bottom of the eye-pit, and detach the skin from the bone.

5. Be careful not to cut the corners of the eye, or the edge of the eyelid. Keep close to the bony orbit, and insert the end of one finger in the eye from the outside, to cut against when you sever the thin membrane that surrounds the eyeball.

6. The nostrils must be cut through so far back from the end of the nose that the cut will not be visible in the open nostril when viewed from in front. The cartilaginous septum that divides the nostrils like a partition wall must be split in two, edgewise, from inside, clear down to the very tip of the nose, so that all the flesh can be cut away. Many a fine head is spoiled by having the flesh left in the end of the nose. It seems all right for a short time, but when it dries, it shrinks and shrivels up, and the nose not only loses all character and beauty, but becomes an eyesore.

7. The lips must be cut from the jaw close to the bone, and afterward slit open along the inside, laid out flat, and the flesh pared off carefully with a sharp knife. Leave one-half to three-quarters of an inch of the inner skin of the lip all the way around, so that the form of the lip can be presently reproduced by replacing the flesh with clay.

8. A deer's ear consists of a big, leaf-shaped piece of cartilage, thick at the base and centre, very thin at the edges and the upper end, and rolled together on itself at the base to form a half cone, like a funnel with one side partly cut away. Over this sheet of cartilage is stretched the skin, with no flesh whatever between the two. This cartilage can be completely skinned out and replaced with a leaden imitation. It must be skinned out; for if it is not done, the hair will probably all slip off the ear; but, even supposing that it does not, an equally bad thing happens. When the head is mounted and dry, the ears will begin to shrink and shrivel up like a pair of dry autumn leaves, and the beauty of the head is gone forever! In skinning out the ear cartilage, a sharp scalpel of large size, or a cartilage-knife, is the best instrument, and it should be held in the fingers precisely as one holds a pen in writing. A good, keen pocket-knife is plenty good enough for all emergencies.

[a]Fig. 33.]—Skinning a Deer's Ear.

Begin at the fleshy base of the ear, detach the skin from the cartilage by cutting, and by pulling and pushing the two apart with the thumb and fingers (Fig. 33). Of course you must stop at the edge of the cartilage, and be very careful not to cut through the skin there. Keep right on up the back of the ear, gradually turning the ear wrong side out, until you reach the tip (Fig. 34). The ear is now wrong side out, and the skin is detached from the back of the cartilage, but still adheres on the inside. Now begin at the tip, where the cartilage is thinnest (Fig. 35), peel it up, and by the same process as before gradually work the inside skin loose without cutting through the skin at any point, until it is free quite down to the base of the ear, so far within that when the skin is cut straight across and turned right side out again, the point of detachment cannot be seen (Fig. 36).