Cleaning blood off feathers

[DC]

I just got some feathers from the turkey farm and the white ones are spattered with blood. What is the safest way to get it off? I've got one soaking in cold water as a test and it's sorta working.

[osage outlaw]

I think I would try warm water and dish detergent.  Then rinse them off and let them dry.

[DC]

I was a little concerned about warm water setting the stain and detergent removing the oils. Have you tried this?

[osage outlaw]

No.  I've soaked turkey feathers in koolaid water.  I've never had to wash them.  Honestly, I would leave the blood on the feathers as long as it wasn't to bad. 

[DC]

There a just one wings worth that got a good blood spray. They are white and I want to dye them a bit so I thought they should be clean. I'll be using hair dressers dye and there is bleach in that so maybe I'm overthinking, again. I did try your warm water and detergent on the one I had soaking and it got the blood out. I'll just wait until it dries to see if seemed to damage the feather at all.

[augustus]

They wash live birds from oils pills with dawn,so im thinkin it work ok for you

[DC]

After they wash them they have to keep them dry until the natural oils come back. But that probably doesn't matter for arrows, especially indoor target arrows

[osage outlaw]

What colors are you going to dye them?

[DC]

I just want to do the back end of the fletch so it looks like a crane/eagle feather. Like the cock feather on this one only not blurry and maybe a little more realistic.

[osage outlaw]

I still think a little bit of blood splatter would make them look cool   

[penderbender]

I still think a little bit of blood splatter would make them look cool   

+1 leave it  on Don! Cheers- Brendan

[H Rhodes]

I haven't had that problem so far this season  .

[mullet]

You guys beat me to it, why wash it off?

[DC]

Like I said, it was just one wing but a few feathers were soaked with blood. A few spatters looks fine after it turns brown.
So What I did was soak in cold water for about a half hour. Then warmish water and a bit of Dawn and borax for another half hour. Rinsed them out a patted them dry. Then I got stupid and put them in the dryer. Even on delicate fabrics setting you can see on the outer edges where the heat started to get to them. They will all be usable as most gets trimmed off. If I could have turned the heat off on the dryer I think the tumbling would have worked well. It sort of preened the feathers.