On the Tanning of a Wolf Hide
The hide from the dissected timber wolf was bagged and frozen immediately after skinning for a later tanning attempt.
The wolf hide weighed between ten and twenty pounds unfrozen and was still matted with dirt and mud from the animal's enclosure. It required one day to fully thaw. Once thawed, it was immersed completely in a solution of borax, warm water, a small amount of bleach, and commercial iodized salt, to wash and help preserve the hide. The hide soaked for approximately 45 minutes with occasional stirring, and then was left overnight, flesh side down, on an autopsy table, due to an unfortunate misunderstanding.
The following afternoon the hide had begun to decompose and was hurriedly stretched and salted, using the plastic autopsy table as an impromptu frame. The hide was stretched as far as possible over the surface of the table (which had a rim approximately 4" high) so that air could circulate around it; it was held in place by a makeshift stretching system of forceps, rope and wire. Commercial salt (approximately four 16 oz. cartons) was rubbed by hand into every available inch of the hide, which was then left overnight to cure. The following afternoon the salt was rubbed off and replaced with fresh salt, and the hide was left for a further day. The following day the fur side was extensively blow-dried with an antique commercial blow-dryer -- the heavy winter fur held the water in exceptionally well -- and then the pelt was left in a commercial refrigerator for two days over a weekend.
The hide slowly dried from pale pink and soft to a heavy, hard and brittle substance, and faded to a flaky white. Grease was always evident along the midline, which never did fully dry and always remained squishy to the touch. Muscle which had been left on the skin dried to a fibrous red mush which refused to come off except by dint of much effort.
Scraping the hide took five weeks of work with a two-bladed metal hand tool. The hide needed to have all but the "true skin" layer of flesh removed, which involved scraping strips of hardened white flesh from the skin until the pores of the true skin layer were visible. The skin had been ineptly removed and much of it, especially the face and belly, was coated with muscle, which never did fully dry and had to be picked and scraped off with the fingers. The flesh could be pulled off in strips if carefully prodded but generally came off in flakes, pushed off by the scraping tool. Between scrapings, the hide was hung from a nail on a plastic string threaded through its ears.
Due to time constraints, when 90% of the flesh had been removed with the scraper, leaving only some stubborn, hard white material around the tail, ears and elbows, a powered hand drill with a small, fine-grain, rounded-edge sanding bit was obtained and used to burn away the flesh down to the true skin. This worked admirably, but heated the skin and in some cases polished it to a fine gloss; it also covered the table, the author and most of the lab with powdered wolf. However, it never broke through the skin, stretched, or tore it, and a great deal of the remaining 10% of the work was accomplished in less than two hours on a hot day.
When fleshed, the wolf skin was soaked in clear water and a small amount of borax for one hour. A tanning solution was prepared as follows: 8 oz common salt and 4 oz sodium carbonate dissolved in one-half gallon of warm water, then slowly added to 16 oz aluminum sulfate dissolved in one gallon of warm water. The mixtures fizzed and foamed upon addition and therefore were combined in a large, ten-gallon plastic tub. Approximately 7.5 gallons of solution was made and the wolf skin left to soak, with daily stirrings, for six days, with a small amount of bleach added to the solution after three days to disinfect the solution and hide in preparation for a weekend.
The skin was removed from the solution after soaking, squeezed, and rinsed with clear water from a hose. The skin was soft and slick and had turned whitish-grey all the way throug the flesh due to the action of the tanning solution. It was squeezed "dry" and then laid out, flesh side down, on the autopsy table, supported in the air by a series of broomstick and mop handles and various lengths of assorted plastic laid across the rims of the table under the hide. It was partially blow-dried over a period of two days and gently hand-brushed, then left to dry overnight. A thin layer of commercial hand soap was painted over the flesh side of the skin and left to be absorbed over three days, with the skin hanging once more upright from its ears. The skin dried thin and slightly brittle, but bendable, and was taken home from the lab.
Completion of the tanning would take effect with an application of neat's-foot or a similar leather-conditioning oil to soften the skin, and some gentle "working" -- bending and rubbing the skin in order to keep the fibres pliable and prevent the skin drying into something which would break at the slightest flexing.
Bibliography
Churchill, James. The Complete Book of Tanning Skins and Furs. Stackpole Books, Harrisburg, PA, 1983.