mounting a bird part 1 skinning

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">well a couple guys asked if i could give them some info on how to mount a bird so here is some photos and a little explanation. i will go threw the basic sorry guys not going threw all i know but will get you started if you want to try this. so lets start with skinning the bird out.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">maybe someone can blow these pictures up for me so you don't have to click on the picture to blow it up.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">things you might want to start. snipes, scapel or knife, a bottle of water to spray on feathers to keep out of the way.&nbsp;</P>

 

<P>were the pen is is about the length of the incision</P>

 

<P>make your cut then work down the sides of the bird as shown in the photos, in these next couple of photos you can see were the breast ends. see the white line across the middle of the body that is were you would cut if gutting the bird.</P>

 

<P>this set of photos shows skinning down towards the back and the last one show skinning towards the vent. what we are trying to do is skinn down towards the legs of the bird</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay here you see that we have found the start of the leg skin down on this i will push up on the feet while i am skinning down the leg.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">then you see the leg mostly free from the body, do you see the white line on the side of the meat, if you bend the leg back and forth you will see that the leg bone attaches right there, cut threw the tendons and deattach the legs</P>

 

<P>skin down past the vent(hole) as you can see in will roll a piece of paper towl and stuff up there to keep all the fun stuff inside and off of the meat.</P>

 

<P>okay now we have skinned down the legs and deattached them then we went and skinned past the vent, next we will detach the tail, this is kind of trickey so take your time, i usually skinn down the side of the bird past the vent , use your finger and feel for the tail bone, sometime you can cut through the tail bone with your knife but the snipes work well here. the first photo shows the tail bone just cut the pencil is pointing at the hole were the bone was. the next photo shows as we skin up and release the tail feathers and the last photo shows the glands on the tail, these will need to come out and i will show you that in the cleaning process.</P>

 

<P>next i hang the bird up using hook, you can make one of these with three big turtle hooks just remember to take this down or hang it high so you don't hook your self later on. photo one shows the bird hooked the next photo shows skinning down the back. see all the fat on this mallard. fatty birds have thin skin so be carefull when cleaning.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay skin down into the wing area, make sure you skin around the bird as you go or you will tear the hide especially down the breast.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">photo 1 shows a side view of the bird my finger is were the birds flight web attaches to the side of the body, be careful and deatach this.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">the next photo shows the back of the bird, you can see were the wings come into the body of the bird, if you can not find the joint move the wing around&nbsp; and use your fingers.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay in the last section you can see were i cut the one wing away from the body do the same on the other side.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">in this photo you can see the steel shot in the wing, only on broken wing to fix on this bird<IMG src="http://www.websitetoolbox.com/images/boards/smilies/thumb.gif" align=absMiddle border=0></P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay now skin down the neck till you reach the back of the head.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">snipe work great here, i use pvc cutter on turkey necks<IMG src="http://www.websitetoolbox.com/images/boards/smilies/biggrin.gif" align=absMiddle border=0></P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay the skin is off of the body, what you don't see is that i now take the body and put it in a plastic bag with the neck stretched out and place it in the freezer for reference.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">okay now get the meat off of the bone, i start with the legs, skin down the leg be careful not to detach the skin from the feet. i usually will hold the leg from the out side pushing up littley my fingers will be were the feathers meet the skin of the feet.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">deattach the meet from the bone.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">next we will work on getting the wings skined down and the meat off. some guys skinn the wings clear down to the finger joint&nbsp; completely turning the wing inside out, as you can see i skin down the main wing bone to the first joint i will go back before cleaning and make a cut on the outside of the wing to open up the area with the two bones to reach this meat.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">start skinning the wing bone from the head back towards the tail. skin till you see the area open up and you will see the start of the two bone area. i cut the meat off of the main bone and cut the top of the bone off hear. i don't do this with the leg bone because of the bone marrow i will do this during cleaning to help keep the bone marrow off of the skin.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">one skinned out duck. now we will move towards the head.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">if you plan on using the real head you have a couple of&nbsp; options, you can make a cut in the back of the head to invet the skull or you can make a cut on the side of the head and do the same each way will place a cut that needs to be sewn bakc together or you can do what i do and cut around the bill and remove the head.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">i was plaining on using the real head on this bird but notice a nice shot hole in his upper mandible</P>

 

<P>okay this set of pic shows were to cut. take your time and cut right on the line were the feathers meet the bill, open the mouth and get the corners too. then skin back. i usually use my thumb and push the skin back.</P>

 

<P>skin back till you reach the eye area. i will stick one finger in his eye and pick up on the skin then cut straight down not back, we want to release the eye lid completely from the eye. you can see the eye lid in the photos it is darker in color.</P>

 

<P>okay after you get the eye lids out start skinning down the back of the head ond down the bottom of the head you will see this area come up, this is the ear canal , cut down and forward alittle to release the ear canal like in the photos</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">skin down the back of the head and deattach head from body, basically a couple of cut and a little tug should do it. if using the head you would clean the skull using borax and a scrapper of some sort and regular screw driver would do, i use dental tools , clean out eyes tongue, and brain the best is to back the borax into the brain cavity were the neck used to attach to the head.if using the real skull expect about 20 to30 minutes to get her clean.</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">sinse i am using a artificial head i will put the head in the freezer to use later for reference.</P>

 

<P style="MARGIN: 0px">well now we have one skinned bird, part 2 will be cleaning and part three will be mounting. i hope this helps some of you guys i would start out doing a mallard that way you know you can skrew it up and it will not be your first canvasback or something. </P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">&nbsp;</P> <P style="MARGIN: 0px">remember if you make a hole you will know what a needle and thread is for. take your time. if you have any questions or coments please start a new thred it basically took all evening to take the photos and the post all of this on hear for you guys, if i only had three hands two to work and one to take pics with.<IMG src="http://www.websitetoolbox.com/images/boards/smilies/rofl.gif" align=absMiddle border=0></P>