For a beginning taxidermist what do you think are some good essentials for a beginner's toolkit? Like what knives do you recomment for someone who wants to keep bones and skins? Types of bags to keep around? Anything like that?
Roadkill Collection/Scavenging:
Gloves
Plastic Bags for small animals (I just save my grocery bags)
Heavy duty trash bags for bigger/heavier animals
A tarp for your trunk
A decent knife set for removing parts of animals
Knife sharpener
Hedge clippers for cutting tails or feet off
A good pair of boots and long pants
A reflective jacket
Hand saw
Skinning/Fleshing/Salting:
Plastic apron
Scalpel & blades
Stop rot
Spoon (you can use it to flesh smaller animals)
Hand fleshing tool
Towels (makes clean up way easier)
Salt
Gloves!
Tanning:
10 Gallon Bucket
Salt
Measuring cup
Gloves..
See TruBond for full list of chemicals needed for tanning
Bones:
Tubaware, can be used for maceration/oxidation/degreasing/whitening
Tooth brushes (for scrubbing nature cleaned bones)
Rot Pots
Steralite/Lock-tite bins for low-smell maceration
Tank heaters (for heated maceration)
Dish soap
Crockpot
Hydrogen peroxide
Arm length gloves for shifting through large maceration tubs
Spade (digging through rot pots)
...Gloves...
Wet Preserves:
Glass jars
Formalin
70% Isopropyl Alcohol
Syringes
Gloves from glove world
Dry Preserves:
Salt/Borax
91% Isopropyl Alcohol
Tubaware
Guantes (that’s Spanish, for gloves)
Jackal’s Closet of Vulture Magic:
PHEW, ok long list but that’s pretty much everything that like to have at all times depending on what I’m processing and how I decide to process it c:! The more/better tools and supplies you have the more options you have for salvaging as much of the animals you get as you can ;o;! I also suggest buying things like salt, gloves, and peroxide in bulk since you’ll p much always need thing like that, and pick up items though necessity as you go! I hope this helps c:
