How To Skin A Racoon

How To Skin A Raccoon – Stride By Step Guide

Skinning your outset raccoon can be a daunting task but information technology should not much unlike than skinning a coyote. Remember that a raccoon is more frail than a coyote and you should take your time especially on the kickoff one to make sure you go a good pelt when y'all are done.

The method we are going to discuss in this article is how to tube skin a raccoon. Tube skinning is ane of the most common means and it tin exist used when selling your fur to a fur heir-apparent, tanning, wall hanging, or slightly modified for taxidermy purposes.

Tube skinning works for many types of animals in North America. This includes the play a joke on, coyote, bobcat, raccoon, and anything in between. If yous are looking to trap raccoon then checkout our raccoon trapping guide. It explains what traps, bait, and sets to apply when trapping raccoon.

Is Information technology Hard To Skin A Raccoon?

Skinning a raccoon can be a little hard at showtime. If y'all are skinning a raccoon for the first time information technology may take an 60 minutes to pare it. Have your time though you should non be in a hurry when you are kickoff starting out and raccoon pelt volition turn out good.

When I skinned my first critter I was trying really hard to do a skillful job and didn't have much practise skinning. There is a learning bend to information technology but information technology is something you can acquire as yous watch someone skinning a raccoon and then effort it a few times.

I have added several instance videos at the bottom of this article so you lot can see when unlike methods of skinning a raccoon. Watch when the person skinning the raccoon is pulling and when they are cutting.

Skinning a coyote and a raccoon are very like. Checkout our article on how to skin a coyote for more tips on skinning.

How Long Tin can You Wait To Skin A Raccoon?

Normally, you are hunting and trapping raccoon in the cold months. October to February is when most raccoon have the best fur.

In cold weather condition, raccoon will not spoil for two to three days and tin be skinned. A raccoon in warm weather needs to exist skinned within a few hours. Raccoon fur left on the carcass can start to spoil or get green belly and the fur will start to turn a greenish color.

Green belly is not initially bad if information technology is lite green but equally it progresses and the bacteria growing on the raccoon pare tin can cause the fur to sideslip or autumn off the hide.

Green belly can be cleaned off with hydrogen peroxide and may not initially ruin a skin.

Tools For Skinning A Raccoon

Raccoon Gambrel
Skinning Knife
Tail stripper
Tail zipper or splitter

How Practise You Professionally Pare A Raccoon?

Most people professionally skinning raccoon are doing information technology to sell the hibernate and make coin. The tube method is the almost common method when selling raccoon pelts.

Steps To Skinning A Raccoon

Cut Management: When skinning a raccoon you may think the cutting direction is down so you can get the skin off simply that volition cause you to nick the fur and put holes in it. Your cutting direction should be perpendicular to the carcass and should cut the white membrane that appears between the carcass and the hide when pulling down on the fur.
Nicking the hide is not a huge deal and tin can be stock-still. Fifty-fifty professionals do it. It tin be sewn together later on in the fur preparation process only information technology is all-time to avoid it. If y'all have nicked the fur exist careful when you pull the fur down off the raccoon that you are non making the pigsty bigger and stretching it out.
Hang the raccoon upward upside down by the back feet with a gambrel or rope around the legs.
Split the fur along the dorsum of the legs where you lot see a color alter in the fur. Beginning at most the back of the human knee and cut in deep. and go around the top of the anus.
Work the sin off around the legs by spreading the hair away from where you just cut and skinning the hide around the leg.
Split the fur at the knee of the raccoon and leave the rest of the fur on the human foot. When you lot have enough fur worked downwards and pull the fur down to about the level of the tail.

How To Peel a Raccoon Tail

Skin downward around the tail creating a gap between the fur on the back and the carcass. Work and skin the fur down the tail an inch or two.
Use a tail stripper around the meat of the tail and pull downward on the fur and tail stripper while you also button upward on the raccoon with the other mitt right where the tail connects to the rest of the carcass.
Utilize a tail zipper or pocketknife to dissever the tail all the mode to the bottom then the tail tin dry out.
Yous should now be able to grab a big chunk of fur and pull downwardly all the way to the shoulders and peradventure a lilliputian farther.
Now you should be able to stick a bar into the mankind between the cervix and shoulder on both sides and pull downwards until the fur on the front leg goes over the elbow joint. The fur can then exist cut around the leg and pulled through the leg hole.

How To peel a Raccoon Face, Ears, Lips and Optics

You lot can now requite another good tug downwardly now that the front legs are out. The head should be the only thing left in. The fur should have stopped at the ears.
Cut straight into the head and you should be able to cut the ear cartilage at the base of the ear on both sides. Yous can at present stick your finger in the ear and not too hard pull downwardly on the hide and continue skinning.
You should start getting into the lips on the sides of the caput. They should start to split from the carcass at the corners of the oral cavity. You lot tin stick your finger in there and pull fairly hard and go on skinning downward the remainder of the head remembering to cut perpendicular to the carcass.
Adjacent, the eyes should be cut fairly deep keeping the eyelashes intact. Again yous volition cut straight keeping the cuts a little deeper around the eyes.

How To skin a Raccoon Olfactory organ and Lower Jaw

In one case both eyes are cut skin the nose all the way downwardly the front of the head until yous are about a half-inch from the terminate of the olfactory organ. Then cut directly towards the bottom jaw and cutting the nose off. The superlative of the fur should now be gratis.
Next, peel the bottom jaw downwards nearly ii inches from the end the cutting it off leaving the bottom few inches of fur on the carcass. Yous won't need that piece. You should now exist washed.

How To Skin Raccoon Paws or Anxiety

In the tube method of skinning a raccoon you lot should non need to peel the anxiety. Every bit stated above y'all tin can cut the fur at the elbows and y'all will be done.

If you lot are skinning a raccoon for taxidermy and then yous volition demand to pare out the feet or paws. You also do non want to cut and leave any of the fur on the carcass.

When skinning out the feet first y'all will desire to split the dorsum of the leg instead of skinning down and cutting information technology off. Continue skinning down the leg until you ar a few inches from the top of the foot.

You can now split the dorsum of the leg until you come to the big pad at the bottom of the foot. Y'all volition and then get-go to skin downward the foot until you reach the tird joint on each toe.

You will demand to work down and skin each toe individually as you piece of work the hide downwards. Split the third joint at each toe as you lot attain it. The middle toes are longer and will be farther to peel than the side toes and then cease out the site toes first.

Learning More

I have added a few videos hither to aid you get a few perspectives on and tips on how to skin a raccoon. Watch these videos and you volition encounter that each person has their own little tricks.