Snake skin storage

[Allyn T]

I found 2 road killed snakes today and plan on skinning them when I get home tonight. What is the best way to store snake skin? Do I freeze it or tack it like raw hide until it drys or some other method?

[gutpile]

I just use a pair of scissors to center cut belly...when you skin make sure you cut around anus or skin will tear when pulling it off.. get a spoon or butter knife and scrape all fatty tissue off skin.. lay on board or cardboard belly up.. thumb tack or staple tack skin flat.. DO NOT STRETCH skin at all..let air dry a couple of days.. at that point you can roll them up or leave flat.. keep away from dogs they will eat them.. I have skins laid out for over 6 years still as good as day I skinned them.. do not salt... no need ..skin is so thin it will be dry in a day or two.. salting will just be a royal pain to clean and is completely unnecessary... also you don't need to freeze or anything like that, they won't rot after they have dried ...gut

[Eric Krewson]

I stretch them when I tack them up to dry, makes them easier to flesh although I only flesh timber rattlers.

I stretch copperheads when I tack them up. I have used a lot of western diamond backs but I bought them, they came trimmed, dried and rolled up.

I have frozen timber rattlers in a zip loc bag full of water for years and years. A friend gave me 14 at one time, I fleshed and dried half of them and gave them back to him for his bows. It took me a while to work through them and put them on a bow because I used more copperheads and western diamond backs on the bows I sold.

There was once a guy on eBay that sold perfectly matched sets of western diamondback skins for $25 a pair. Those days are long gone.

I just checked eBay, same guy, not too bad but these skins are tanned, he often has air dried ones. Look up "bsktcas", the seller.

[gutpile]

reason why I don't stretch them is they dont look as sharp when you can see in between scales.. when you wet them to apply to a bow they wont shrink back completely to cover that up either.. up to you I guess but I never stretch mine ...you can freeze them whole till ready to skin..no need to water either.. my buddy had a pet store had some baby eastern diamond backs... and timber rattlers... he had them in freezer for years in a ziploc baggie.. they were fine.. gut

[Yooper Bowyer]

they were fine

Exempt that the poor things where frozen hard as rock. 

Good to know though.

[Allyn T]

Ok I'll dry and not freeze and see how it goes. Another question, one of them is kind of stinky should I wash it after I skin or will drying clear that up and halt the degredation

[Pat B]

I usually wash snake skins, either after skinning or at least before adding it to a bow. I use Dawn and warm water then roll up in a paper towel a then add to the bow or staple to a board to dry. The stink in decomposition so you probably wash before drying. I have used stinky skins on bows and they hadn't deteriorated but did still have a slight "fragrance".

[Eric Krewson]

I never noticed a scale gap in stretched skins, perhaps I didn't look close enough, I have skinned over 50 bows. I learned not to use TB 1 or 2 for skins as the yellow shows through and changes the whole color of the skin and not for the better. I like Elmer's stainable wood glue or TB3 which are both tan.

On of the pics of my wife's bow, I reached for the TB1 by mistake and had the skin on and setting before I realized my error, yellow as can be.

These others look Ok to me.

[Allyn T]

Tb3 and wash it, got it, thanks guys. These are black snack skins just fyi, and one has a beautiful belly, it's all pink and coral colored with black splotches, really neat

[Pat B]

You can cut the belly scales off and use them to back a bow too. Clint did this and it looked quite good.

[BowEd]

Cut the head off/skin em/flesh em/and tack em out......Done!!!They'll keep dry for years.If your worried about bugs.Put them in a zip lock bag and spray a little deep woods off in there.
PS....If your worried about color showing through on thin skinned snake skins dye the bow for better contrast.

[gutpile]

Eric those look nice.. I have skinned quite a few bows myself..maybe 20 not 50, I stretched a skin once and it did not turn out as nice as not being stretched.. so from my experience I do not stretch skins at all I leave them in their natural shape.. my favorite skinned bow believe it or not was from two tanned canebreaks skins I got a a hunting show.. wasn't sure they would work but I soaked them in hot water and dawn dishwashing liquid.. rinsed in hot water ,wrung them out good and let air dry as if just skinned .. soaked before applying ,it came out incredible.. the colors were amplified by tanning process and the scales laid down as flat as non tanned.. wish I could post a pic.. never works for me anymore..I always used TB for skins.. however... one of my skinned bows finally developed frets , a mulberry recurve I didn't build wide enough.. it eventually failed.. if I had used hide glue I might be able to soak it or heat it and get my skins back.. not with TB.. they are never coming off...BTW one of my copperhead skin bows I left belly scales on and run them of the side of limbs to belly.. where I rasped off the left over.. looks pretty cool too...gut

[Eric Krewson]

People once gave me skins all the time, they would be in a Walmart bag leaned against my garage door, sometimes I never knew who dropped them off and never heard from anyone, people just knew I needed skins.

Once I found two gigantic canebrake skins left at my door, they were a little old, faded and boraxed to the hilt. I put one on the Trad Gang St Jude auction giving in detail its condition, it went for around $50

I decided to use the other one on a bow my nephew was making in the shop, I washed it and scrubbed for at least a half hour to get the borax out. Once wet I found that it needed fleshing, I bet I took a half pound of meat off it before I was done.

Like you I found that this old neglected skin handled properly made a really nice backing.

Here is my nephew and his bow, I have posted this picture recently.

[Allyn T]

Don't you scrape the scales off after the glue drys?

[Dances with squirrels]

Don't scrape, you can damage the skin. Some will come off during the process, and most others can be removed with gentle use of masking tape, then closely inspect for any that were missed. You can usually pick the leftovers off with a fingernail or the tip or your pocket knife... carefully. Don't leave a single one behind.