posted December 01, 2007 11:12 AM                  

quote:

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To us it is not about the money but the principal.

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Well said….

Don’t get me wrong I like the money but the principle is the driving force behind skinning or otherwise utilizing fur. You are going to hunt coyotes anyway so I just look at the time skinning as overtime at work. With little damage you could put up 4 coyotes an hour. Last year I averaged around 29 dollars I think for my coyotes. When I keep telling my self that I am making over 100 dollars an hour putting up coyotes I would be lying to say it is not worth it.

This pic below is what you like to see after you skin an animal. The fallowing one is not a good deal. LOL

I have a doctorate in sewing up coyotes but even so I still have to remind my self that principle, not profit is why I am doing this.





I can honestly say that I can only remember throwing away one coyote do to fur damage and I didn’t even shoot it. A buddy gut shot one with his 6x284 shooting 87gr V-maxes at about 40 yards. The shot didn’t kill it instantly so he fallowed it up with a second that caught the coyote through the neck and across the back. It was bad.

When a coyote receives bullet damage you have to remember that the fur is all or very very near all still there. The damage is mostly caused by a rupturing affect. Some times it is nice and strait or round. But sometimes if you hit bone or get a raking shot you will have a starburst to try and lay back together.

If done right a fur buyer is not going to find much of any damage from a sew job no matter what size there are a lot of tricks to the trade but quantity really helps also. When you bring in 100 to 150 coyotes at a time they are not going to spend much time at the grading table. Typically they will have a table with a florescent light a few feet directly above it. They will lay the coyote hide on the table hold the head down with one hand, grab the base of the tale with the other hand and give it a pop or two to fluff up the fur. If all the fur comes up strait they flip it over pop it again to look at the belly and then it gets thrown into a pile. If a spot comes up on the fur when they pop it that is matted down or kinked they will run there fingers over the spot and maybe comb it out a bit but very rarely do they actually look up into cased coyote.

The main thing to watch out for is bullet burn. It doesn’t happen much but sometimes it does on some raking shots. Bullet burn is when the bullet cuts fur before it enters the animal or if it is at enough of an angle the bullet will hit the animal and when the bullet comes apart the fragments shave off strips of fur. You will identify these areas when skinning so it is best to deal with them right then and their. Bullet burns are always strait so you just simply cut out the strip that is damaged and it will be an easy sew job.

Hope this helps.

Good hunting.

Q,