Tanning a Python Hide

The next step in tanning the Python Hide was to mount it onto a board with something that would keep it from curling as it cured.

I rummaged the school maintenance shop with permission and found just the right 2 pieces of plywood, a sack of brads to nail down the hide, a hammer and a tool to remove the nails later.

The directions compelled me to space the nails just 1/2 an inch apart, so I banged in quite a few nails over an hour.

The latex gloves kept getting caught and torn, so I ended up using my bare hands and really washing them well after. Though I kept wondering if my hands smelled of snake after...

The hide had to air dry overnight, but smelled foul the next morning--odd, since the snake was classed as an amphibian. ;)

That morning, I mixed up a tanning oil made with 8 parts Glycerine, 4 parts Alcohol, 1 part Formaldehyde and slathered the hide in the stuff--all told we used about 1 quart (liter).

It took a while for all the product to soak in, breaking down the tissues along the way. At its final phase, some of the tissues were so permeated with glycerine that the hide was transparent!

~ Shien