This week I’m focusing on the cleaning and preservation of the cow skull I collected while on a trail ride a few years back. The first step of preserving a cow skull is to remove any soft tissue from the bone. My skull has been sitting in my backyard for the past few years so any soft tissue left on her when i found her is completely gone thanks to my flesh eating bug friends that live outside.

I am currently on the maceration part in my preservation process which is to remove any grease or protein left on her. There are two types of maceration methods; hot water maceration and cold water maceration. My cow skull is very massive and I don’t have a pot big enough to fit her in to do hot water maceration so im using the cold water technique She’s been sitting in a massive bucket fulled with water and dawn dish soap for the past month or so with one water chance around the two week mark. She smells absolutely disgusting and im worried she’s not degreased enough because of how smelly and dirty the water is but I’ve cleaned and scrubbed her off the best i could. I’m also not sure what the yellow mucus is in the water… that’s disgusting. The hardest part is removing all the moss that’s grown on her during the years.

Before i can move on to the whitening process i have to let her dry out first for at least a day or two. Once she’s dried out I’ll be placing her back in the bucket but this time with a concentrated hydrogen peroxide solution and let her soak for around a day. I am most nervous for this step because im worried I’ll forget about her or procrastinate and leave her soaking for too long and have her come out brittle and cracked.