LESSONS LEARNED FROM AN ATTEMPTED SKULL MOUNT
Well, this did not work out quite like I planned.
Last year, I went deer hunting for the first time ever. My first morning out, I shot a nice buck.
Not that I'm all about bragging or things like that, but I figured I might as well at least try to preserve the antlers. To do so, I decided just to do a "skull mount." Basically, this is the probably the cheapest and easiest way to do it.
MY ATTEMPT
I thought that just by hanging the head up in a tree, I would be able to get the desired effect. Once everything dried or rotted, I planned on removing the rest and just having the skull with the antlers on it, but there was one thing that I did not account for...
This is the culprit... well, not the exact one, but I know that squirrels are behind it. Since they are rodents, they need to gnaw to keep their teeth trimmed. Also, antlers and bones contain Calcium, which they need. Often, they will dispose of the bones after the scavengers eat the flesh and the bugs remove the rest when an animal dies in the forest. Mice, rabbits, and other rodents join in as well, but since mine was up in a tree, I'm not going to blame the wild rabbits.
Thankfully, none of the antlers were chewed all the through. They are nibbled up to be sure, but still basically "intact." In the end, maybe it just adds more character to the skull mount.
Sure, some of it's "former glory" has been removed, but now there is even more of a story to tell, and a lesson to be learned as well. I think that one day it'll hang on a wall of our house, we will just have to build it first. The mount should look similar to the cover image, which is of a skull I found in the wild, but the rack will be bigger and more gnawed up! Lesson learned guys, learn from my mistakes.!
As always, I'm @papa-pepper and here's the proof:
proof-of-gnawed-antlers
Until next time…
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What I've been doing, that a buddy taught me when I first started hunting a couple years ago, is burying the head for several months. The first one I dug up late the following spring and still had some brain goo to clean up. The second one, well, I keep forgetting to dig up, and should probably do that soon...
So I dug it up yesterday, and probably should have dug all the way around where the skull was first. Instead when I hit the antlers I used them to wriggle the rest out of the ground, and it looks like most of the skull broke away, which is disappointing, but not a huge deal. Now it just needs a little cleaning up.
I like hunting
Next time you could try the proper way: you cut off as much of the flesh as possible, remove the brain and then boil the skull, until the remaining tissue falls off. That takes a while, but at least no squirrels will jump into the boiling water to get to the skull. :)
Good point, might have to be proper next time.
It may be worth concidering it, even if its a bit more work. But it also prevents that the thing gets smelly if you hang it up inside the house. Its how the pros do it.
We've gone a slightly different route on head mounts.
We (wife, father-in-law and I) place the skull in a bucket of water for a few weeks (antlers out of the water of course)
Still a bit of a mess to clean out the vicera (eyes, skin, etc) but its fairly quick and efficient at cleaning off the skull.
Merry Christmas!
Might try that next time, as long as there are no squirrels on the bucket.
The case of the -gnawed-antlers! Thanks for sharing @pappa-pepper have a great holiday season ;)
Hey@road2wisdom hope all is well with you and Merry Christmas!
Isn't critters so awesome, they clean and use everything on this blue planet ;-)
At least there is lesson to learn . thanks for sharing @papa-pepper
I congratulate you on catching very sweet pose
That's cute....I had a pet rabbit once who used to bite into my phone chargers :D
hmmmm....never hunted, dont know what its like to kill an animal besides a roach or something