ESpy's request: salmonskin

[Diederik Pomstra]

There was some talk about salmon skin-tanning. Here's what I do, it works with other fishskins as well:
1. clean the skin: get rid of the meat,
2. Grab 'head' and tail and pull: all the scales will stand up (not with every species though). Rub and scrape them off.
3. Wash in soapy water (or lye) to get some of the fat and oils off,
4. Put skin in what you are tanning with: brains, oliveoil and/or eggs, urine, tanningsolution of bark (oak, spruce, willow etc. they all work),
5. Rinse (wash again when you've used urine) and let dry a bit.
6. When it seems rather dry (feels still cool) soften by rubbing and add some fat/oil. Especially when you've used tannin: it eats away the natural fats in the skin.

I think urinetanning is not too good: not stable, can't wash it I guess. Fat- and braintanning is always good (I love braintanning). Tannins give a strong durable leather, but the fishskin is hard to soften. I got some tears in those. I would recommend fat or braintanning. Don't forget to smoke the skins....
Enjoy! It's fun and as always very rewarding.
Diederik

 

[leon-b]

2. Grab 'head' and tail and pull: all the scales will stand up (not with every species though). Rub and scrape them off.
Diederik

wouldnt you need 3 hands for this lol
leon

 

[jerv]

I read that the native peoples of hokkaido (ainu) used salmon skin footwear as they are waterproof. Is it that easy to tan fishskins???? seems alot easier than the furs i've been working with. I use unnatural chemical agents as i have found no information on braintanning while keeping the hair on.

 

[torjusg]

Diederik

I don't think urine itself tans skin. It is an agent for removing oils. If you use oak to tan with, it will be very hard, but alder comes out very softly.

And would doubt that braintanning fish skins would be good for waterproof skin. The braintan leaves an open fibre structure in the skin that inevetably will soak up water.

But hey, I may be wrong.

Jerv, there is a something about hair on tan on braintan.com I think. Also the book: Blue Mountain Buckskin has something about it.

 

[andyn]

wouldnt you need 3 hands for this lol
leon

nah nah nah

you hold the tail between your teeth and then use your hands for the other bits.

Its like those people that can only press one keyboard butting per hand, so pressing ctrl-alt-delete to log in is impposible, that why we used to tell them to use their nose.


In regards to the fish skin tanning, its not something i had even thought of before, interesting read. Cheers.

 

[Ketchup]

I used to have a wallet made wolf eel skin (catfish, UK sense of the word). It lasted for ten years. But usually fish skins are noy as tough as 'turf' skins.

I read somewhere Icelanders used to measure distances by the number of cod skin shoes one needed to go from point a to point b.
e.g. they would make a four shoe or a six shoe trip from one village to another

 

[Diederik Pomstra]

Diederik

I don't think urine itself tans skin. It is an agent for removing oils. If you use oak to tan with, it will be very hard, but alder comes out very softly.

And would doubt that braintanning fish skins would be good for waterproof skin. The braintan leaves an open fibre structure in the skin that inevetably will soak up water.

But hey, I may be wrong.

Jerv, there is a something about hair on tan on braintan.com I think. Also the book: Blue Mountain Buckskin has something about it.

Bit more on urinetanning: the first 8 hours urine is acid, at that time you can tan with it. If you leave it standing longer ammonia is formed which is the opposite: it works well for getting rid of fats. But like I said: it's not a very solid tanning and little suitable for thicker skins. I read about several native peoples that combine urine and bark-tanningmethods.
The braintanned salmonskins are still pretty waterproof. The fibrestructure is completely different from other skins, it doesn't open up that much. Really large fibres. When my salmonskin-hat is ready and I've been out in the rain a bit I'll let you know.
Diederik

 

[ESpy]

Now I've finally had time to read this, it's about time I said thank-you!

This has raised even more questions, I'm afraid - how long should the skins be in the tanning solutions? Given the size of a salmon, is the quantity of brains really enough to do a whole skin? How many egg yolks to a whole salmon?

I've got some salmon that I did with very strong tea; that turned out OK, but understandably the skin went fairly brown and stiffened up - rubbed a load of neatsfoot oil into it, but it remained quite hard. I'm sure I've heard a suggestion to use hand cream on tanned skins too?

 

[stovie]

..... I'm sure I've heard a suggestion to use hand cream on tanned skins too?

Toddy mentioned this some time back, in regard to softening skins (not fish though).

 

[Diederik Pomstra]

Hello again,
I did use handcream sometimes when the skin dried to fast. I'ven been told that all it does is put some moisture in the skin. The fats/oils do not seem to do much good. But I'm not sure really. I do not use cream when tanning larger skins (both braintanning and barktanning), if they drie out too soon I put them in a bag rolled up with a wet rag or something, or, in case of braintanning, rebrain them in the brainsolution.

Times for tanning: brains and eggs/oliveoil a couple of hours. the skins are really thin and it helps if you move them around a bit. There is no sure way of telling when they are soaked through with fats. I use entire eggs, not only the yolk (also when tanning deer etc) and you can do a couple of salmonskins with one egg and some oliveoil. Urinetanning can't be overdone, so I put them in overnight: 8 hours.
Barktanning takes longer, depending on the temperature of the solution, but I think I left them in two or three days. I tan most with oil/eggs/brains. I haven't tried with the brain of the salmon itself though, so I do not know if that's enough. I get my skins without the fish itself...if you try, let me know!
One more thing about getting the scales off: you won't need your teeth , after you've stretched the skin the scales remain standing up, so they're easy to remove.
Now I've to get back to my deerskin...it's great weather for softening here (incredible...this is no winter..).