Amy (Do you like to boss people around?) - Nope, I don't like being 'in charge,' that's way too much work & it's plain rude. owo;;
B (Do you talk a lot?) - With peers that are acquaintances, not very much (if anything I try to avoid conversation ^^; ) BUT WITH CLOSE PALS I CAN TALK FOR HOURS WOW!!
idiot-skull replied to your post: i have 1/4 cup of bugs. thats… not as ...
do you have to go somewhere certain to have the bones and stuff cleaned? that stuff is really dirty and carries a lot of germs. or is it something you can clean on your own??
ya its not that difficult. you can ask a taxidermist to clean them, they tend to charge for it tho since i mean, that's... their job... but you can do it yourself relatively simply.
if you have a raw skull you pop the eyes out, take as much flesh as you can out, and you can introduce dermestids or maggots (your call) or you can even just kind of... wrap the skull in chicken wire or put it in a closed trap and let nature take its course without pulling your skull apart into a million pieces. or you can bury it, which takes longer, but you guarantee the bones to stay in a group really
or you can put it in stockings, tie it off, then put it in a bucket with an aquarium heater and sort of cook the meat off it-- boiling it is a bad idea because a) your house will smell like a corpse and b) it degrades the bones and makes them brittle. but ~90 degrees fahrenheit is an alright temperature. let it stew for a week, changing the water as needed, also it will smell like a corpse just fyi don't dump that shit in your house
then you can degrease it/clean it by putting it in a bucket of dawn dish soap and warm water for a while. it takes forever if you do it this way and don't use degreasing chemicals-- a bear can take a year of just sitting in a bucket w/dawn dish soap and periodic water changes, they're greasy as fuck dude. raccoons and hogs are greasy too. something lean and with less subcutaneous fat, like a deer or fox, usually won't be a big deal and take much less time-- 2 weeks to 2 months, roughly
mummified stuff is basically the same but w/90% less meat and it doesn't smell as bad as outright rotting/cooking rotting flesh
also if you use gloves, generous amounts of soap, face masks, etc., it's pretty safe. the biggest scare is rabies with things like raccoons and bats, you really can't handle them without gloves! and gloves are probably ideal for handling even clean skulls so they don't absorb your hand oils and degrade the bone over time (that's why you degrease in the first place, after all, it makes the bone brittle from absorbing oil and grease from subcutaneous fat)
idk i probably skipped over some key facts here but it's pretty basic? you can also just leave roadkill out and monitor it and keep it together and get it "nature cleaned" which is just kind of... "the birds and shit ate all the meat for me so it's cool"
also picking up roadkill is illegal in some states (deeply frowns at texas) and you have to take legalities into account for things like furbearers, trophy/hunting animals, pets, protected species, BIRDS holy shit birds are 90% illegal, etc... like, birds are super illegal unless they're non-migrant or an introduced species, essentially, crows and pigeons are okay but if you breathe wrong at a roadkill owl you will be arrested and have a $1,500 fine on your hands
human shit is 100% legal though like you want some fetal skulls? ok. dead child skulls? totally legal
but god forbid you look at that roadkill hawk i saw your finger touch that feather on your instagram pic how does jail sound you sick son of a bitch
also you can have dog/cat skulls and bones but NOT their pelts in most countries, presumably because in order to have a nice pelt the animal has to be very recently killed to prevent fur slipping (falling out). you can own one but you can't sell, trade, or buy them. so if your cat dies, you can have him skinned/freeze-dried/etc. and turned to taxidermy but you can't sell his body
