This is probably better suited to the taxidermy forum, but I don't know anybody over there, and you guys might benefit from the tip...

I got my skulls back from Zim, and while they were clean, they did have stains and grease on them. At the advice of my taxidermist, I boiled them for 45 minutes in an outdoor turkey frying pot with water and some blue Dawn dishwashing liquid in it.

Then I put them warm into a five gallon bucket filled with unscented paint thinner.

They came out just like a museum display. Perfect.

And the broth from the pot was great with a little salt and some veggies!

Mark,

Post some photos of the finished product.

Tim

N'gagi.

Don't forget the garlic! Babooon broth is much better with fresh minced garlic!

try it you'll agree!!!!

That's a lot of paint thinner.

Thanks for the tip.

I owned a taxidermy shop for several years and was always very wary of boiling skulls. There's a point that is reached when the suture lines holding the pieces of the skull together will finally give way and the skull can fall apart!

For degreasing, I used to put the skull in Coleman fuel for a couple of days and then wash with soap and water, rinse it, and then to the whitening process.

I never had a problem with that method.

Good luck!

JDS

You know, maybe I am goofy but I dont particularly like PURE white skulls. As they yellow, they just seem to get a lot more character to them. I was at The Manial Palace yesterday looking at King Farouk's old hunting trophies and the aging skulls were actually quite nice. Aside form the 186 gazelles and probably 15 or 20 Nubain Ibex shoulder mounts, there was a really nice (and incredibly heavy) Greater Kudu skull mount there and a Lord Derby Eland skull mount that was also breathtaking ... but they looked every day of their 50 years. COOL!

A shiny white skull mount is like a hunting rifle with no scratches and a perfect blued finish. Nice, but just not right.

JMHO,

JohnTheGreek

Your recipe is incomplete, your supposed to piss in it to kill the taste....