I study veterinary medicine and I need a clean animal skull for visualization. 
So, a friend of mine who works in a slaughterhouse will get me a wether’s head tomorrow.
What I need to know now is how to best get the flesh off and the brains out, without needlessly damaging the skull.
Cooking it in acid would macerate the bone, wouldn’t it? What about peroxide bleach?
Her’s a good PDF article on Cleaning and Preserving Animal Skulls.
Thanks, Q. E. D.!
But…
Wouldn’t cooking it thoroughly first make the skin and flesh more tender and easier to remove?
Cool sig, btw. Better than the… erm, scholarly old one.
Tear it up. Tear! Tear it!
Yes, but from what I’ve read, boiling it too much will distort the skull. I’d suggest steaming it istead.
What is a wether? My uncle used to boil cat’s skulls for his bio class; my sister buries cow and horse skulls in anthills. The very best critter is said to be the darkling beetle…
Trinopus (rumored to come from an offshoot of The Addams Family…)
A castrated ram.
These beetles do sound good, yes. But I don’t know if the anatomy guys at university are giving them away.
Beetles are the way to go if you can find them. You can also just put the skull outside and catch “free-range” dermistid beetles if you have the time.
I used to boil my skulls, but I didn’t like the results. There’s also the chance that the teeth would crack. I use the “bury and dig up later” method right now until I can get a beetle colony.
I’m also about to experiment with another method I was just told about. You get a bucket of water and throw in a few handfuls of top soil. Add skulls and let sit for a month and let the microbes do their work. It’ll stink but you will also have some good fertilizer in the end. I have a whole box of skulls to clean, so I need to get to work…