Handbook of field and general ornithology : a manual of the structure and classification of birds / with instructions for collecting and preserving specimens.
- Elliott Coues
- Date:
- 1890
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Handbook of field and general ornithology : a manual of the structure and classification of birds / with instructions for collecting and preserving specimens. Source: Wellcome Collection.
64/360 page 52
![(5) Special Processes; Complications and Accidents The Foregoing’ Method of procedure is a routine practice applicable to the “general run” of birds. But there are several cases requiring a modification of this process; while several circum- stances may tend to embarrass operations. The principal special conditions may therefore be separately treated to advantage. Size.—Other things being equal, a large bird is more difficult to prepare than a small one. In one case, you only need a certain delicacy of touch, easily acquired and soon becoming mechanical; in the other, demand on your strength may be made, till your muscles ache. It takes longer, too; ^ I could put away a dozen sparrows in the time I should spend over an eagle; and I would rather undertake a hundred humming-birds than one ostrich. For large birds, say anything from a hen-hawk upward, various special manipulations I have directed may be forgone, while however you observe their general drift and intent. You may open the bird as directed, or, turning it tail to you, cut with a knife.^ Forceps are rarely required; there is not much that is too small to be taken in hand. As soon as the tail is divided, hang up the bird by the that he has seldom purchased a birdskin, never sold one in his life, and for some years has owned none. Excepting a few given to friends, his ornithological specimens, as well as those in other departments of natural history, have always been presented to the United States Government, and deposited in the national collection at Washington. 9th September 1889.] ^ The reader may be curious to know something of the statistics on this score— how long it ought to take him to prepare an ordinary skin. He can scarcely imagine, from his first tedious operations, how expert he may become, not only in beauty of result, but in rapidity of execution. I have seen taxidermists make good small skins at the rate of ten an hour ; but this is extraordinary. The quickest work I ever did myself was eight an hour, or an average of seven and a half minutes apiece, and fairly good skins. But 1 picked my birds, all small ones, well shot, labelled, measured, and plugged beforehand, so that the rate of work was exceptional, besides including only the actual manipulations from first cut to laying away. No one averages eight birds an hour, even excluding the necessary preliminaries of cleansing, plugging, etc. Four birds an hour, everything included, is good work. A very eminent ornithologist of America, and an expert taxidermist, once laid a whimsical wager that he would skin and stuff a bird before a certain friend of his could pick all the feathers off a specimen of the same kind. I forget the time, but he won, and his friend ate crow, literally, that night. 2 Certain among larger birds are often opened elsewhere than along the belly, with what advantage I cannot say from my own experience. Various water-birds, such as loons, grebes, auks, gulls, and ducks (in fact any swimming-bird with dense under plumage), may be opened along the side by a cut under the wings from the shoulder over the hip to the rump ; the cut is completely hidden by the make-up, and the plumage is never ruffled. But I see no necessity for this ; for, as a rule, the belly-opening can be completely effaced with due care, though a very greasy bird with white under plumage generally stains where opened, in spite of every precaution. Such birds as loons, grebes, cormorants, and penguins are often opened by a cut across the fundament from one leg to the other ; their conformation in fact suggests and favours this operation. I have often seen water-birds slit down the back ; but I consider it poor practice.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28068130_0064.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
