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| THE FAQ PAGE! |
Q. Why would anyone want to mess around with dead bones?
A. Oh come now, don't you remember when you were young how fascinated you were with
things like dinosaurs? Didn't you ever put models together? Were you ever interested in your own
body or anatomy? Have the shapes and forms of nature never fascinated you? Most kids before
they reach an age of artificially stifled curiosity, are fascinated by bones and skeletons, even
more so if the bones are real. Skeleton projects have enthused students like few other hands-on
projects I have ever seen.
Q. So how do I go about getting an animal?
A. Often it is the tail that wags the dog. Someone comes across a dead animal and this leads to a
desire to do a skeleton project. For those that are starting with the idea of a project and need an
animal, there are many sources, depending upon where you live. With the right attitude and the
backing of a school or institution, animals can sometimes be acquired from a zoo, game farm,
animal shelter, hunter, Fish and Game Department, farm, meat processing plant, taxidermist, or
even collected off the road as road-kill.
Q. What animal should I try to get?
A. Almost any large bird, mammal, or reptile can work for a skeleton project. A mature skeleton
works much better than one from a young, still growing animal. Something rabbit-sized or larger
is easier to put back together than a small animal due to the tiny-ness of some of the bones,
especially in the feet. There are ways of making skeletons out of smaller animals if that is the
desire, however, by not taking the animal all the way apart and doing what is called a
ligamentary skeleton. This is where the ligaments are left in place and they hold the bones
together.
Q. What animals can I legally work on?
A. Depends on who you are and where you are. Generally, there will be few problems if the
animal is huntable or domestic. Marine mammals and many birds often come with so many
layers of regulations that only a museum or a federal agency will be able to legally process the
animal.
Q. Can I catch diseases doing this?
A. Yes. For that reason you should wear rubber gloves, but in twenty-five years of bone-work I've
never personally known anyone to get sick from processing animal skeletons. You are much
more likely to catch something from your best friend than from a dead animal.
Q. How do I clean the skeleton?
A. There are many ways of cleaning animal skeletons. Depending on the size, age, and species
of the animal. Many bone specialists have a favorite method. For classroom use, some methods
are better than others. Some methods work much faster than other methods. Bones can be
rotted, macerated, boiled, cleaned with chemicals, enzymes or bugs. Details are given in the
bone manuals for the different methods.
Q. How do I bleach animal bones?
A. The easiest way is to put the bones out in the sun for a year. The problem being that someone
or something might find them before you get back to them. To safely bleach the bones artificially,
drop them in 3% hydrogen peroxide (in a plastic container with a lid) for several days. The
hydrogen peroxide used is the kind you can buy in the brown bottle at the drugstore. The bones
should come out very nice looking. Let them dry. If they start looking oily and greasy, they will
need to be de-greased some more. This should really be done first before bleaching.
Q. So how do I get the oils out?
A. Soak the bones in 50% clear ammonia solution, using a plastic container, for a week. Rinse
them and if they are very oily they may need to be soaked again in fresh ammonia solution. some
bones are much more oily than others. After rinsing, they can be bleached.
Q. What's the best way to clean bones for a classroom?
A. There probably is no best way, but there are clearly some methods that you don't want to do.
Most classroom projects I've worked on have done their bone cleaning by boiling the skeletons
outside over an electric hotplate or, for big skeletons, over a propane burner. This is often a
weekend project or, for small skeletons it can happen over a long day. It often takes eight hours
of boiling for many skeletons. Small or young animals can take a lot less time.
A new method that is gaining favor for classrooms is to sandwich the skinned and gutted animal
between fresh horse manure in a plastic tote (with a snap-on lid) for four to six months. When
done, retrieving the bones is like archaeology. You get to excavate a cleaned skeleton from what
looks and smells like mulched grass clippings. The carcass in the tote can stay in the classroom
without offensive smells. The lid probably needs to be popped open every week for fresh oxygen.
This is the "Horse Poop Processing Method."
Q. How long will a skeleton project take?
A. This depends mostly on what method you use to clean the bones, as methods can range from
a week to a year or more for cleaning. Assuming the skeleton is ready to assemble, a skeleton
can take from 40 to well over 100 hours to articulate. A classroom organized into groups can get
a bear or wolf-sized skeleton finished mostly in a week if everything goes smoothly.
Q. How many people can work on a skeleton at once?
A. This depends on how big the skeleton is. For something the size of a rabbit or chicken,
probably not more than two people. For an animal the size of a wolf or bear, a whole class can
work on it by dividing the animal up into sections and having pairs of students clean and later
articulate their own section. As the sections are combined into a whole skeleton, less and less
people can work on it at one time.
Q. If I do a skeleton project with my class, how much money will I need to raise?
A. This depends on how much money you already have. It also depends on the size and type of
animal and how you intend to clean it. A mature moose skeleton was cleaned and articulated and
put on a base with wheels for $120. A wolf skeleton came to about $80 worth of materials.
Q. Why don't you have a manual for a horse skeleton?
A. I was hoping that the moose manual would suffice for a horse. They are about the same size.
The main difference is in the feet. There are many well done sources of information about horse
skeletons such as; "An Atlas of Animal Anatomy for Artists" by Ellenberger and Baum. In truth, I
have never had a horse skeleton to work on, but one day I'll get there and add horsey details to
the existing moose manual.
Q. How did you get started with bones?
A. I was one of those nerdy science obsessed kids who would rather be labeling my butterfly
collection than going to the party down the street. My interest in science carried through
adulthood and I was in the right place at the right time and volunteered to help at the local natural
history museum with a whale skeleton.
Q. What is the biggest skeleton you've ever done?
A. A Sperm Whale at 41-feet long.
Q. What is the smallest skeleton you've ever done?
A. I did a little brown bat once as a project with my daughter when she was in Jr. High.
Q. Do you have or have you considered doing a manual on human skeletons?
A. The skeletons I work on have been animals that were found dead, usually as road-kill, or
animals that have washed up on local beaches. I've never found a dead human, besides,
somehow I think the locals would take a dim view if they thought I was working on human
remains in my garage. Besides, there is no shortage of books that describe the workings of the
human skeleton. I understand there is a small demand for information on repairing articulated
human skeletons, but this is not something I have ever worked with. Most human skeletons are
loosely articulated so that the joints have mobility to them. This requires fasteners that are made
specifically for this purpose. There are places that articulate human skeletons and these would
be a likely source to acquire the fasteners.
Q. What is this about a new technique for cleaning skeletons using hydrogen peroxide?
A. I haven't done much more experimentation with it after my first burst of enthusiasm. I had good
luck with it on a few things and then got over confident and ruined a series of small skeletons (I
was trying to get a vole skeleton to come out fully articulated). I think it can be done this way but
the timing has to be just right. There is a brief write-up about this method in the Small Mammals
Manual, and a more complete write-up in the Bone Builder's Notebook. Essentially, small
skeletons (or sections of skeletons) are soaked in ammonia for a week or so, and then in 15%
hydrogen peroxide for a couple weeks, then in a fresh batch of 15% hydrogen peroxide. If the
timing and the concentrations are right, it is possible to get a fully articulated skeleton out of the
solution with no obnoxious smells in the process. -----It is also easy to get a skeleton that is totally
disarticulated with severe bone damage.
A. Oh come now, don't you remember when you were young how fascinated you were with
things like dinosaurs? Didn't you ever put models together? Were you ever interested in your own
body or anatomy? Have the shapes and forms of nature never fascinated you? Most kids before
they reach an age of artificially stifled curiosity, are fascinated by bones and skeletons, even
more so if the bones are real. Skeleton projects have enthused students like few other hands-on
projects I have ever seen.
Q. So how do I go about getting an animal?
A. Often it is the tail that wags the dog. Someone comes across a dead animal and this leads to a
desire to do a skeleton project. For those that are starting with the idea of a project and need an
animal, there are many sources, depending upon where you live. With the right attitude and the
backing of a school or institution, animals can sometimes be acquired from a zoo, game farm,
animal shelter, hunter, Fish and Game Department, farm, meat processing plant, taxidermist, or
even collected off the road as road-kill.
Q. What animal should I try to get?
A. Almost any large bird, mammal, or reptile can work for a skeleton project. A mature skeleton
works much better than one from a young, still growing animal. Something rabbit-sized or larger
is easier to put back together than a small animal due to the tiny-ness of some of the bones,
especially in the feet. There are ways of making skeletons out of smaller animals if that is the
desire, however, by not taking the animal all the way apart and doing what is called a
ligamentary skeleton. This is where the ligaments are left in place and they hold the bones
together.
Q. What animals can I legally work on?
A. Depends on who you are and where you are. Generally, there will be few problems if the
animal is huntable or domestic. Marine mammals and many birds often come with so many
layers of regulations that only a museum or a federal agency will be able to legally process the
animal.
Q. Can I catch diseases doing this?
A. Yes. For that reason you should wear rubber gloves, but in twenty-five years of bone-work I've
never personally known anyone to get sick from processing animal skeletons. You are much
more likely to catch something from your best friend than from a dead animal.
Q. How do I clean the skeleton?
A. There are many ways of cleaning animal skeletons. Depending on the size, age, and species
of the animal. Many bone specialists have a favorite method. For classroom use, some methods
are better than others. Some methods work much faster than other methods. Bones can be
rotted, macerated, boiled, cleaned with chemicals, enzymes or bugs. Details are given in the
bone manuals for the different methods.
Q. How do I bleach animal bones?
A. The easiest way is to put the bones out in the sun for a year. The problem being that someone
or something might find them before you get back to them. To safely bleach the bones artificially,
drop them in 3% hydrogen peroxide (in a plastic container with a lid) for several days. The
hydrogen peroxide used is the kind you can buy in the brown bottle at the drugstore. The bones
should come out very nice looking. Let them dry. If they start looking oily and greasy, they will
need to be de-greased some more. This should really be done first before bleaching.
Q. So how do I get the oils out?
A. Soak the bones in 50% clear ammonia solution, using a plastic container, for a week. Rinse
them and if they are very oily they may need to be soaked again in fresh ammonia solution. some
bones are much more oily than others. After rinsing, they can be bleached.
Q. What's the best way to clean bones for a classroom?
A. There probably is no best way, but there are clearly some methods that you don't want to do.
Most classroom projects I've worked on have done their bone cleaning by boiling the skeletons
outside over an electric hotplate or, for big skeletons, over a propane burner. This is often a
weekend project or, for small skeletons it can happen over a long day. It often takes eight hours
of boiling for many skeletons. Small or young animals can take a lot less time.
A new method that is gaining favor for classrooms is to sandwich the skinned and gutted animal
between fresh horse manure in a plastic tote (with a snap-on lid) for four to six months. When
done, retrieving the bones is like archaeology. You get to excavate a cleaned skeleton from what
looks and smells like mulched grass clippings. The carcass in the tote can stay in the classroom
without offensive smells. The lid probably needs to be popped open every week for fresh oxygen.
This is the "Horse Poop Processing Method."
Q. How long will a skeleton project take?
A. This depends mostly on what method you use to clean the bones, as methods can range from
a week to a year or more for cleaning. Assuming the skeleton is ready to assemble, a skeleton
can take from 40 to well over 100 hours to articulate. A classroom organized into groups can get
a bear or wolf-sized skeleton finished mostly in a week if everything goes smoothly.
Q. How many people can work on a skeleton at once?
A. This depends on how big the skeleton is. For something the size of a rabbit or chicken,
probably not more than two people. For an animal the size of a wolf or bear, a whole class can
work on it by dividing the animal up into sections and having pairs of students clean and later
articulate their own section. As the sections are combined into a whole skeleton, less and less
people can work on it at one time.
Q. If I do a skeleton project with my class, how much money will I need to raise?
A. This depends on how much money you already have. It also depends on the size and type of
animal and how you intend to clean it. A mature moose skeleton was cleaned and articulated and
put on a base with wheels for $120. A wolf skeleton came to about $80 worth of materials.
Q. Why don't you have a manual for a horse skeleton?
A. I was hoping that the moose manual would suffice for a horse. They are about the same size.
The main difference is in the feet. There are many well done sources of information about horse
skeletons such as; "An Atlas of Animal Anatomy for Artists" by Ellenberger and Baum. In truth, I
have never had a horse skeleton to work on, but one day I'll get there and add horsey details to
the existing moose manual.
Q. How did you get started with bones?
A. I was one of those nerdy science obsessed kids who would rather be labeling my butterfly
collection than going to the party down the street. My interest in science carried through
adulthood and I was in the right place at the right time and volunteered to help at the local natural
history museum with a whale skeleton.
Q. What is the biggest skeleton you've ever done?
A. A Sperm Whale at 41-feet long.
Q. What is the smallest skeleton you've ever done?
A. I did a little brown bat once as a project with my daughter when she was in Jr. High.
Q. Do you have or have you considered doing a manual on human skeletons?
A. The skeletons I work on have been animals that were found dead, usually as road-kill, or
animals that have washed up on local beaches. I've never found a dead human, besides,
somehow I think the locals would take a dim view if they thought I was working on human
remains in my garage. Besides, there is no shortage of books that describe the workings of the
human skeleton. I understand there is a small demand for information on repairing articulated
human skeletons, but this is not something I have ever worked with. Most human skeletons are
loosely articulated so that the joints have mobility to them. This requires fasteners that are made
specifically for this purpose. There are places that articulate human skeletons and these would
be a likely source to acquire the fasteners.
Q. What is this about a new technique for cleaning skeletons using hydrogen peroxide?
A. I haven't done much more experimentation with it after my first burst of enthusiasm. I had good
luck with it on a few things and then got over confident and ruined a series of small skeletons (I
was trying to get a vole skeleton to come out fully articulated). I think it can be done this way but
the timing has to be just right. There is a brief write-up about this method in the Small Mammals
Manual, and a more complete write-up in the Bone Builder's Notebook. Essentially, small
skeletons (or sections of skeletons) are soaked in ammonia for a week or so, and then in 15%
hydrogen peroxide for a couple weeks, then in a fresh batch of 15% hydrogen peroxide. If the
timing and the concentrations are right, it is possible to get a fully articulated skeleton out of the
solution with no obnoxious smells in the process. -----It is also easy to get a skeleton that is totally
disarticulated with severe bone damage.
| URL: http://www.theboneman.com Boneman Last Update: January 24, 2008 copyright 2005 by Lee Post illustrations by Lee post |
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