Taxidermy

A most important point is the packing of skins for transport; the skins should be packed with plenty of naphthalene, and, in the case of large mammals, turpentine may be used to protect the skins against insects. The latter spirit should not be used indis criminately on bird-skins, as it dissolves the fat in the skins and this will adversely affect the colour and condition of the plumage.

Procedure with Mammals.--•With

mammals, whether they are required for study or mounting purposes, operations must begin by measuring the dead animal while still in the flesh; head and body, tail, ear, and hind foot must be measured, in feet and inches for large beasts, in millimetres for medium-size and small mam mals. Then comes the important item of writing the label for the skin; the measurements just taken should be entered on one side of the label, together with such field notes as may be desir able. On the other side the date and locality of capture, sex and *The superior figures placed after authors' names have reference to books mentioned in the bibliography.

collector's number and name, must be recorded. A second label should be prepared giving the collector's initials and number, for attaching to the skull when freed from the body. In skinning a large animal, such as a tiger, care should be taken to conduct the whole operation in the shade; if no shade is available a tent should be pitched. The body is then slit up from the edge of the lower lip to the tip of the tail, and cross cuts are made from this median incision along the limbs to the feet. The skin should be removed as cleanly as possible, all fragments of fat or muscle, must be removed with the body, and not left on the skin; other wise the hair will tend to slip at the spots where flesh remains inside. The nose, lips, eyes, paws, and ears require very careful and thorough skinning; the thick skin around the base of the whiskers should be-scored so that the preservative can get well in, and the spongy tissue inside the pads of the feet should be cut away. The skin should then be well washed and hung up, hair-side out to dry. It should then be placed hair downwards on the ground, preferably on a mat, and gently pulled into correct shape and size. Then follows the application of the preservative, after which the skin is allowed to dry (out of the sun), and can then be folded up. Skinning a medium-sized, or small mammal is a slightly different operation, as here the only incision needed is a median one, along the abdomen; the limbs and head can be skinned out by simply turning the animal inside out. The limbs should be skinned as far down as possible and the bones of the feet severed from the carcase and left in the skin; occasionally the limb-bones are left in as well. The tail in most small mammals can be skinned by taking a firm grip of the base of the vertebrae and pulling the tail out of the skin; in medium-sized specimens it is frequently necessary to assist this operation with a ventral incision. The skin, after treatment with the preservative, is then moderately stuffed with wool, or wood-wool, according to the size of the animal, and a wool-covered wire inserted down the tail and up the body as far as the chest and head. After sewing up the body the specimen is pinned out to dry, with its fore and hind limbs stretched out parallel with the body, and the label tied on to the right hind foot. Care should be taken not to stretch

a skin during these operations; an inexperienced person, with a heavy hand, can easily convert a five inch weasel into a ten one; on this account it is best to make the skin, as nearly as possible, the same size as it was before removal from the body, as indicated by the dimensions on the label. To skin the head of a horned animal it is necessary to make a transverse incision behind and between the horns, from the centre of this slit another cut is made down the back of the neck; the skin can then be removed leaving the horns on the skull.

Birds.

The skinning of birds is somewhat similar; the humerus, or upper wing-bone, is first broken; an incision is made either down the mid-line of the stomach, or under the wing, as far as the vent ; the body is then skinned out by severing the legs, after stripping the bones, at the middle of the thigh-bones, and the wings are similarly treated, being severed at the fracture of the humerus. The head may often be approached through the skin of the neck; in some larger kinds it is necessary, however, to make a small dorsal incision in the neck. The eyes, muscles, and brain are then removed, and preservative and cotton-wool take their place. After cleaning the wings and treating the skin with preservative it is moderately filled with wool and sewn up. Care must be exercised in drying bird-skins, and paper bands, or cones, are frequently used to keep the feathers in position.

Reptiles.

Reptiles are treated much in the same way as mam mals. With fish the incision is not made down the centre of the belly but along the less important side, from gill to tail. The skin can be manipulated neatly from each side of the incision; the fins should be severed from their attachments, but not too closely. Great care should be taken not to bend, or otherwise injure, the skin, during the removal of the body, as the scales are very fragile and easily detached. After treatment with pre servative, the body should be filled with dry sawdust or sand, after which the specimen can be neatly sewn up; it may then be allowed to dry and the sawdust or sand removed in due course.

Mounting, in

the second branch of taxidermy, that of mount ing or modelling, it will be impossible in this article to give more than a brief outline of the intricate processes involved. A model, or "manikin," is built up to represent as nearly as possible the body of the animal, special care being lavished on the proper representation of the muscular system and veinage; the skin, which has been made as thin and pliable as possible, is then stretched over the model and sewn on in an invisible manner. Frequently additional realism is produced by covering the "mani kin" with a thin layer of modelling composition, so that the skin may be moulded to the desired form.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-See

authors' names above. 'Instructions for Col lecting and Preserving Various Subjects of Natural History (1794) 'The Naturalists' Guide for Collecting and Preserving Subjects on Natural History and Botany (1822). 'Taxidermist's Manual (Glasgow, 1833) . of Instructions for Collectors, British Museum (Natural History) (1921) . 'Rowland Ward's Sportsman's Handbook (1923). 'Taxidermy and Zoological Collecting (1901 ) . (J. G. D.)