Category: Uncategorized

thylacine-dreams:

This incredibly rare thylacine specimen is an eviscerated adult female that lived at the London Zoo from 1884-1893. She is preserved in ethanol at the
Swedish Museum of Natural History

in Stockholm, and is considered to be the best preserved thylacine specimen in existence.

In 2009, DNA was extracted from the hair of this specimen in order to sequence the mitrochondrial genome of the species, with hopes of sequencing the complete nuclear genome in the future. [x]

For a beginning taxidermist what do you think are some good essentials for a beginner’s toolkit? Like what knives do you recomment for someone who wants to keep bones and skins? Types of bags to keep around? Anything like that?

blackbackedjackal:

Roadkill Collection/Scavenging:

  • Gloves
  • Plastic Bags for small animals (I just save my grocery bags)
  • Heavy duty trash bags for bigger/heavier animals
  • A tarp for your trunk
  • A decent knife set for removing parts of animals
  • Knife sharpener
  • Hedge clippers for cutting tails or feet off
  • A good pair of boots and long pants 
  • A reflective jacket
  • Hand saw

Skinning/Fleshing/Salting: 

  • Plastic apron
  • Scalpel & blades
  • Stop rot
  • Spoon (you can use it to flesh smaller animals)
  • Hand fleshing tool
  • Towels (makes clean up way easier)
  • Salt
  • Gloves!

Tanning:

Bones:

  • Tubaware, can be used for maceration/oxidation/degreasing/whitening
  • Tooth brushes (for scrubbing nature cleaned bones)
  • Rot Pots
  • Steralite/Lock-tite bins for low-smell maceration
  • Tank heaters (for heated maceration)
  • Dish soap
  • Crockpot
  • Hydrogen peroxide
  • Arm length gloves for shifting through large maceration tubs
  • Spade (digging through rot pots)
  • …Gloves…

Wet Preserves:

  • Glass jars
  • Formalin
  • 70% Isopropyl Alcohol
  • Syringes
  • Gloves from glove world

Dry Preserves:

  • Salt/Borax
  • 91% Isopropyl Alcohol 
  • Tubaware
  • Guantes (that’s Spanish, for gloves)

Jackal’s Closet of Vulture Magic:

PHEW, ok long list but that’s pretty much everything that like to have at all times depending on what I’m processing and how I decide to process it c:! The more/better tools and supplies you have the more options you have for salvaging as much of the animals you get as you can ;o;! I also suggest buying things like salt, gloves, and peroxide in bulk since you’ll p much always need thing like that, and pick up items though necessity as you go! I hope this helps c: