Cleaning bones

P

Pete Allan

Joined
Oct 29, 2003
Messages
220
I ended up with 4 deer legs so I thought I best take care of them befor something hauls them off. I plan to cut the joints with about 5" of bone attached and my thought was to just pressure cook them for a couple of hrs to remove all but the bone. What do you guys do? I don't want handles that will attract "things" :eek:
Thanks for the help
 
You might consider leaving them outside for the winter intact, up high where critters won't find em. Then, come spring, put em where there's an anthill. Instant bonecleaner!
 
DON'T PUT THEM IN A PRESSURE COOKER!!!

You will end up with bone meal or mush.

Clean them up as good possible. You can then SIMMER (not boil) them a bit to get the meat off of them. You can add your Ritz dye as well. Do it outdoors because the smell will get to the missus.

Do this for 2 to 3 hours, turn the fire off and let sit overnight. Simmer them again the next morning for a couple of hours. I have used a mixture of 1/3 ATF and 2/3 gasoline to coat them with and then layer in newspaper for about 3 weeks. This works well just don't it close to a spark or flame!

Always be sure to use fresh bone. (If you don't the bone will crack.)

The recipe above was given to me by Clyde Fisher at the Spring Hammer In in 2001. He said he got the recipe from the guy at Case Knives. I wish I could have met him earlier, what a man.

Craig
 
Don't boil the bones hard unless you are making soup.Clean off all the meat and tissue you can first.Simmer them in plain water for an hour or two.Clean them off and clean the marrow out.(Dye them to get a nice brown color).Dry them well .Use a fine grit flap sander to clean up the residue at the joints.Either soak them in some sort of oil (ATF,PEG,baby oil,etc) ,or better,send them to Mike at WSSI to be properly and permanently stabilized.Whatever you do,make sure they are totally dry before you use them.If not permanently stabilized,they will shrink some with time.
 
depend on where u live but u can put them outside and let animals eat it away. where i live only small rodents and cats will get to it so it works great. ant hill is still the best tho, they get rid of the marrow and meat.
 
I don't even bother cleaning bones, I buy them from Moscow Hide and Fur. $1.50 deer and $3.50 elk all cleaned and dried. I'll only do it if a customer brings me one.
 
I'm sure it works well, but I don't think I could bring myself to clean bones indoors (well, at least the last ones I had, they smelled awful). There are two methods I am familliar with that let nature do the work. First, take a big flower pot (like the kind you put trees in, or anything else that will completely cover the bones. Make sure it's the kind that has the little holes in the bottom. If it's a really heavy one, then just turn it upside down and put the bones underneath it. The ants and things will strip them clean in a couple of days. If you don't have a flower pot that big (and who would?) you can bury the bones in a compost heap. If you have a good compost heap, the bones will be perfectly clean in a couple of days (even if you left the meat on) and it'll work in the winter, too.

- Chris
 
When I have used deer bones in the past, someone one this forum gave me this advice.

Get as much soft tissue off of the bone as possible. Then boil the bones, you will have to change the water often, becuase a bunch of nasty stuff will come to the surface. The last couple of times you change the water add a little bleach. I did this with about 20 deer shin bones. It took probably 4 hours of boiling and dumping the water, maybe 6 or 7 times. I added bleach the last two times. I had very clean white nice bones when I was done. IT stunk like hell, and I will never do it inside again. I then used leather dye on the bone, and it came out great.

Kyle Fuglesten
 
indian george said:
I don't even bother cleaning bones, I buy them from Moscow Hide and Fur. $1.50 deer and $3.50 elk all cleaned and dried. I'll only do it if a customer brings me one.
Click to expand...

That's the best way yet!!!

Craig
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top