Lynx thawing
 

Going to be skinning my first lynx soon. It’s frozen solid. What’s a reasonable thaw time and temperature? Biggest thing I’ve thawed and skinned next to this was a couple 11-12 pound fishers.

I keep my garage at 65 degrees. Takes a full 48 hours to thaw.

I run my garage at 10 Celsius. Thinking that will be 72 hours?

Two days for sure. My garage is 10-12 and they are hanging. I have 5 thawing right now. Hung them at 4 yesterday and the legs are thawed today, the bodies are still hard.

I keep my garage at 12, takes about 2 full days.

If you want to thaw that lynx out faster wrap it fairly tight in a thin breathable sheet or burlap. By flattening the fur out you reduce its "R-value" significantly. A quicker thaw helps prevent green belly. Put a fan on it also

Congrats on the lynx

Green belly if present happened before it froze.

Technically you may be right but practically I'm telling you a cat that thaws faster has less chance of belly hair slipping.

Technically right and practically right are the same thing. Green belly happens before it freezes because of heat generated by enzyme and bacteria action in a full gastro intestinal tract. If you are unlucky enough to catch a full wolf/cat/whatever in warm weather and it takes to long to cool down the intestinal action, then green belly can certainly be bad enough to cause hair to slip in the affected area. The slippage of course won't show up until the animal thaws.

One pound of de-ionized salt per gallon of water and your choice of pickling solution to bring the ph down to 2 is an excellent choice for defreezing thinned skinned animals. First , the salt and low ph almost immediately stop the growth of bacteria that normally affect the roots of the hair and second , if defreezes the animal in a matter of hours instead of days. A lot of taxidermists use this method when dealing with thin skinned amimals. Also means that you have to neutralize the skin with baking soda in a solution for 15 minutes and a few god clean water rinses from the washer and a little bit of detergent. Makes them smell and look really good.