Don't bother trying to re-hydrate if you have a bunch of pelts to do. It takes +1 hour to re-hydrate enough to safely turn the pelt and you still might not be able to turn the face without pliers. I re-hydrated two pelts good enough to put through the washer. No slipping but one had a 10" rip that had to be sewn (probably from the still hard mouth). It was quite a chore getting them on the boards fur in. It didn't help that the skinner used narrower boards than you're supposed to.
In my ultimate wisdom I decided to get a start on a couple more pelts by soaking them in water. Now I have to deal with those two but I'll wait a couple of hours before attempting anything.
The other 8 pelts are cleaned up and in a bag. Those ones at least look decent.
Apparently combing out burrs, etc isn't something that everyone does before skinning and fleshing.......who would have known? I was brushing out sticks, burrs and even bird crap. It's hard for me to believe that Trappers would actually send their fur in like that.
Totally my fault for not doing my due diligence. I got EXACTLY what was agreed upon and that was skinning and fleshing......nothing more than that. Lesson learned.....never again.
