Hide tanners?

[joshkk]

Got my deer brain slurry warming on top of the woodstove.... Wondering who else here tans the hides of animals they kill... I've braintanned a few elk, both hair on and hair off. This is the first deer I've killed and am tanning it's hide. SO much more modest of a project than an elk!

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[Stomper]

My dad was a hide tanner… me and my sister couldn't sit down for a week sometimes!

 

[Andy54Hawken]

I've done so a few times....the elk jacket in my avatar and shown below was brain tanned by me.
Lots of work...I've done it enough to know that I really don't want to do it anymore....
Andy

 

[saxon]

rabbit with alum and salt hair "giggles" on

 

[PaulF]

rabbit with alum and salt hair "giggles" on

You done this?

I raise meat rabbits (just started this year) all 4 that I've butchered i didn't know what to do with the hydes so I threw them away.

If you have use for the hydes I'll let you know next time I decide to send one to the crock pot/freezer.

It might be a little while because my last 2 are females (started with 6 have butchered 4) i want to get some males to repopulate my stock before harvesting anymore.

But wasn't to sure I was going to stick to raising them when I started, wishing I'd been a bit more selective when picking previously.

 

[saxon]

You done this?

I raise meat rabbits (just started this year) all 4 that I've butchered i didn't know what to do with the hydes so I threw them away.

If you have use for the hydes I'll let you know next time I decide to send one to the crock pot/freezer.

It might be a little while because my last 2 are females (started with 6 have butchered 4) i want to get some males to repopulate my stock before harvesting anymore.

But wasn't to sure I was going to stick to raising them when I started, wishing I'd been a bit more selective when picking previously.

no real use now but i still have the recipe somewhere, it's a 2 week prosses of stirring and changing out the water salt and alum but males great
pelt's, i raised Flemish giant with rex at around 8 weeks you had average of 4 Lb of meat

 

[Andy54Hawken]

Here is , for those interested in such things....
A shooting pouch I made....it came from the same hide as my jacket mentioned earlier.
( I made the powder horn as well...)
Andy

 

[joshkk]

Here's a couple other follow-up pictures of the tanning project: stretching it in a rack while working it with a slightly rounded wood maul handle head as it dries by the woodstove. Note the looseness of the twine, proof of how much it stretches while being worked... I had to retighten the twine all around probably three or four times during the process. In this picture the white parts around the perimeter (generally thinner parts of hide) are pretty much finished drying, the greyer section in the middle is still damp. I finished by smoking it over a real smoky fire, low flame, covered with chunks of wet mossy bark that I'd been removing from firewood and just leaving out in the rain. The smoking is what turns the color from white to golden/brown "buckskin" color and the smoke also chemically gives it some water repellency.

One of the two holes in the upper left is the entrance wound, the one on the right about a third of the way from the top is the exit wound, the others are skinning holes.

 

[BBQ Guy]

This really cool.
It is something i would love to learn how to do.
Would you consider showing a guy how to do this?

 

[joshkk]

This really cool.
It is something i would love to learn how to do.
Would you consider showing a guy how to do this?

I doubt that I'd have time to work it out to hands-on show someone and I'm definitely no expert, but I'd be happy to answer questions or give a written description of the process.

 

[joshkk]

I like to do beadwork too and it's a real special pleasure to make nice gifts out of home-tanned buckskin. Here are the first couple little projects I made from some pieces of this hide, both gifts for my sweetheart.

The pattern reversed from there going up the rest of the lighter, I just wanted to show a pic with the buckskin visible, and the pouch is about 7" square. On the lighter, the suede inside of the hide is out, on the pouch the hair side is out.

 

[Deavis]

Here is , for those interested in such things....
A shooting pouch I made....it came from the same hide as my jacket mentioned earlier.
( I made the powder horn as well...)
Andy
View attachment 1077395

What is it about M/L that makes you make your own accessories?

When I bought my blunderbus I called down to the BP shop in Springfield and joked I would be there as soon as I crafted a wagon.

 

[joshkk]

What is it about M/L that makes you make your own accessories?

When I bought my blunderbus I called down to the BP shop in Springfield and joked I would be there as soon as I crafted a wagon.

"Authenticity!" Just another part of keeping the old ways alive and keeping in the spirit of indigenous and early frontiers-people, who had to make most of their own things with the materials provided by the natural world.