How To Process A Deer Hide

January 28, 2021

My second hide turned out perfectly, and after a big deer season i have four more hides in the freezer waiting for me. With the right conditions, you can age the venison, process and store it to enjoy later.

How to Tan Deer Skin While Leaving the Hair On Tanning

If you are really interested in learning the lye process of deer hide tanning you can find some great instructions in matt richard's book deerskins into buckskins.

How to process a deer hide. Before butchering deer, we must take the hide off. In order to process deer hides into suitable material for clothing, you will need to remove all of the flesh and other material adhering to the hide. Deer hides processed in this way are known as buckskin, which was commonly used for clothing by native americans.

The deer is then hung for several days to age the venison, and only then is the hide removed. Cover the unused brain matter. The hides should then be tanned to prevent rotting and to soften it.

Skin the deer and bone out the tail. Check with your local pharmacy or farm supply store for ammonia alum or potash alum. Roll up the hide and place it in a plastic bag.

Fill a plastic or wooden barrel with five gallons of warm water. Scrape every particle of fat and flesh from the hide with a knife. You don't want to go deeper than this or you'll cut through the hide.

The whole process will take you a few days, so be prepared. Begin skinning your deer by making a cut down the back of the hind legs. This will begin the tanning process of your deer hide with the fur still attached.

Be careful not to cut the achilles tendon, as you will hang the deer from that at a later stage. After you have made the incision, you can start to pull the skin down the leg, like removing a sock. Here is a great video from realtree.com that demonstrates the skinning process.

Once the hide has been removed from the animal, it’s ready for processing, but be sure to keep the skin in a cool, dry place while working with it. Other hunters prefer removing the hide before allowing the deer meat to age, completely field dressing the deer before hanging. To tan a deer hide with an acid solution, start by removing all flesh and fat from the deer skin.

The meat should be kept at as close to, or below, 40 degrees f as it can be, to prevent spoilage. For a more complete run through of hide tanning, join us for our comprehensive online hide tanning course. Fleshing the hide is the process of scraping off the flesh and fat, which prevents the hide from rotting.

See more ideas about deer hide, tanning hides, deer. Overview of how to tan a hide by brain tanning. So knowing how to hunt and process a deer are vital in a homesteading lifestyle.

If the skin is not soft and pliable, work more brain matter into the hide and return to the bag for two more hours. It will also be somewhat messy and stinky. An upright beam and a waist beam.

This process is called fleshing the hide. We’re going to focus on tanning a deer hide to keep things relatively manageable but within the broad range of animals that most. For a fallow deer about 12 eggs are required per hide, well mixed with water in a ratio of about 4 parts water to 1 part egg.

Tanning using eggs with a hide where the hairs are kept on it is best to apply the solution with a sponge or cloth until it soaks in. Obviously, bigger, thicker hides will take longer to soak and dry than little rabbit hides will. What you’ll need to tan a hide.

Scrape the other side of the hide to remove any membranes and skin. After my first hide, i spent the money on a fleshing knife and rounded the ends of the board i used for the process. Soak the hide in the solution for three to four days, stirring three times daily, until the hair falls off the hide.

It is also not necessary, so i will skip further discussion of the use of lye for soaking. Cut away all the excess meat and fat from. Here is how you butcher a deer and process the meat:

Then, mix water, bran flake water, salt, and formic acid to create your brining solution. Deer meat should be aged a minimum of three days and to over a week if possible. Pour in 1 gallon hardwood ashes and 2 pounds slaked lime.

On the hind legs, cut the inner thigh skin from the crotch to the shin area. Making a work surface suited to scraping a hide is not too difficult. Place the hide on a fleshing beam (a beam designed to hold the hide in place as you work) or on a tarp on the ground.

Keep the meat as clean as possible. Once you have had a successful hunt using the best crossbow or gun, it is paramount to take care of your hunt and process it properly and in a timely manner. ‘if possible’ is meant to convey a warning.

The process for any hide is essentially the same with the exception of drying times. Once near the shin area, cut all the way around the deer’s. Fleshing means removing all the flesh from the skin.

Soak in water or a bucking solution Start in the corner of the flesh side of the hide and get to work with pressured strokes, holding the knife blade or scraper perpendicular to the hide. The lye process is also a little involved, and i want to keep things fairly simple.

Of washing soda and 8 oz. Evaluate the hide and trim off edges; Remove the hide from the plastic bag and work the hide through your fingers.

Plus, you can process the deer into many different kinds of meat. If the deer is hanging upside down from a gambrel, you will start from the top and work your way down to the head. I found a better stool and zipped through the process.

The upright beam (the one i use, pictured) is a log or half a log (perhaps 4 to eight inches in diameter or a piece of pvc pipe of the same size and almost as long a the tanner is tall) leaning up against a tree with the hide draped over the top. Place the bag out of the sun for three hours. Deer is one of our main meat sources throughout the year.

Take the deer hide out of the mixture and rinse well. Don't scrape too deep or you will put holes in the hide. Use a fleshing blade to scrape off all visible traces of flesh and fat using quick, strong strokes.

Thankfully, it is a pretty easy and quick process once you get the hang of it. There are two common methods; Place the hide on a sawhorse and scrape the hide to remove the hair and skin using a large knife.

Mix to dissolve in the water.

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