Keep Calm and Carrion

I'm Clay, I've got a love of wildlife and animals in general. Heck, I'm went to college for Wildlife Biology. Long time casual vulture, figured I might as well make a blog for it. He/Him and very queer

[shiftythrifting]

[coyotevvitch]

friendly reminder that the “ethical vulture culture” doesn’t really exist and death at the hand of humans is much more humane than slow, natural death as well as being hit by a car. i personally would rather an animal was dispatched quickly and humanely, but in the end, death is death. it is not automatically ethical just because they weren’t killed on purpose by a human. also note that this blog is run by an aspiring fur farmer 💖 thx

[notoriousnugg]

🤭 guilty

[blackbackedjackal]

Okay so it's midnight and I'm way too tired to be awake right now, so take this with a grain of salt, but I just had a thought. Skin is just an organ right? And you can preserve skin in a way where it's soft and pliable. Could you theoretically do this with other organs? Could you tan intestines? Could you tan something that can't be broken in, like a heart?? Is there any way to preserve organs that leaves them soft and dry?

You’re good fam, you sound like me at 4am when Nabs and I are yelling about coyote conspiracy theories lmao

You can dry preserve organs to some extent and like, I don’t know ANYTHING about organ processing aside from drying/wet preserves but they made violin strings out of catgut (it wasn’t really cat intestine - short for cattle gut - but large animals intestine but Animaninacs just rolled with that shit in the 90s in that one Rita & Runt episode). Either way the strings would have to be processed to be vaguely durable/pliable, and I remember once or twice while I was picking up roadkill the entrails were outside of the animal and looked like they had been dried/inflated by the heat. I think with the right processing you could theoretically like soften thin organs like that to be pliable, similar to reptile/snake skin. Idk how if someone double dog dares me AND sends me an animal carcass in the mail I’ll legit just mess with the organs and see what can be done.

[sarcogyps-calvus]

Yooooo! You can 100% tan ruminant stomachs and bladders with bark tanning methods, and I know of at least one person who braintanned bison pericardiums (the thin sack around the heart) to reproduce an old indigenous made rope. So yes! You can totally tan organs.

[theartofmany]

Artist: Xi Zhang Title: Collections “hobby” Wonderful drawing…

[thatsbelievable]

Source: The New York Tattler, July 8, 1909.

[line-and-ink]

The hunt on Flickr.

[guild-of-calamity]

Now on Redbubble 

https://www.redbubble.com/people/melancholymoon/works/26988225-into-the-forest-i-go?asc=u

[blackbackedjackal]

Hey do you know any good advice for cleaning/protecting pelts in a bed bug situation? Turns out my apartment has a bed bug problem and it's very possible my pelts may have gotten infected/infested.

So I’m currently dealing with a clothes moth problem and holy shit I sympathize with you (I also had a bed bug problem in my dorm in high school ick). I had an exterminator come in to help me out and he recommended using Bedlam Plus which is for all kinds of insect infestations on fabric and clothes. He said he used it when a friend of his who had a taxidermy collection where some dermestids from his shop had infested his trophy room and the Bedlam got rid of them. I’m still in the midst of dealing with the moth problem (I sprayed all my hides and taxidermy in that part of the house both fur and leather side, 3 times on each animal) and I haven’t seen any additional damage since then but I plan to spray again when I order some more because I’m HELLA PARANOID but basically I recommend freezing your hides for at least a week if you can then spraying them with the bedlam then re-freezing them for another month. I can’t freeze all of my stuff at once but like I said I haven’t seen any additional bug damage since I started spraying (only dead moths) so yeah I recommend it.

[blackbackedjackal]

I have a question, but if you feel like this might inspire some bad anons/responses feel free to ignore it. I agree with your views that roadkill is inherently an unethical way to source animals. Why do you still work with them? I ask not because I’m trying to accuse you or put you on the spot but because I respect your viewpoints as an experienced vulture and as someone who wants to be involved in vulture culture when I’m able to I want to carefully consider where I’m getting my parts from.

Keep reading

[neonprotagonist]

time to write a weird poem from the perspective of a deer in the headlights at 3 am 

[neonprotagonist]

i often hear how humans talk of crossroads how they look the devil dead in the eye and dare him to move forward.

i stand alone on ground which kills and look the devil in the eye and dare you to move forward.

[decapodareptanita]

So uh I really liked this

[everythingstarstuff]

Artist: Anna Ezer Title: ‘Antlers’

[harelip]

[birbbones]

I posted a photo of a porpoise I was cleaning up a few days ago! Here's the result thanks to the very warm weather we've had.

Harbour Porpoise skull, found off the coast of Scotland, kindly donated to me and added to my Cetacean License. He has some soil staining on his 'beak', and I'll probably degrease him later on in the week if any more grease surfaces.

Other than that here he is! I spent a few hours patiently sorting, organising and gluing in his 98 teeth, (he's missing about 30 or so!!). I hope you guys like him. If you'd like any more photos of my Cetaceans please let me know.

[sarcogyps-calvus]

Very, very cool!

Is it a juvenile or are they just that small?

[porterr-robinson]

[lakidaa]

They are in fact walking like that to not alert the worms they’re there.

Good choice of music.

[citrusapples]

@glumshoe

[sundavr]

Woodcocks are the best birds.

I nearly step on at least one every spring shed hunting.

[monopearl]

Ovis Canadensis is finally complete! I really struggled with the coloration and the proportions on this one.

I’m a bit unsure about how I like the background so I might go back and change it.

[scoutsmoocrew]

God “but animals don’t need this in nature to survive” is such a stupid argument

you know what happens to animals in nature? animals die. en masse. constantly.

“Wild cows” don’t get AIed, they get pushed around by an aggressive bull every 21 days for 12 hours and they’re programmed to tolerate it because that’s just what estrogen does to their brains. every time they go into heat they risk having their backs broken or getting an STI. Young heifers get bred whether or not they’re technically ready because bulls don’t care.

What happens to wild animals when things go wrong? They die. Nature loves death. Death is not a bad thing in the natural world. Death is rampant and feeds life. The heifer that got bred too young? She fucking dies giving birth because she has no help 🤷‍♀️

Wild baby animals (pigs!) get eaten by their parents but it’s ok because they tend to have big litters which increases the chances that even just one will make it to survival. Tasmanian devils give birth to 50 joeys but only have 4 teats which means only four will survive and she’ll eat the rest. Weak offspring will just die, there’s no loving mother wild cow nursing her premature deformed baby back to health, she leaves it for the wolves.

Natural doesn’t mean better!! Animal husbandry is supposed to be better than nature!!!!

Livestock really have it good compared to wild animals.