Touchy subject, snake remains.

[Mike Cavanaugh]

As everyone knows, people use snake skins for all kinds of things. Everything from boots to wall decorations. That said....

Lets say you have a georgeous 4,000 gram old female that passes away from natural causes. You discover the dead snake less then 12 hours after it dies. You freeze it to preserve the body. Do you think it would be wrong to use the skin for something? Lets face it, you can't do a whole lot with the remains when fido the dog or milo the cat dies, but the remains of a dead snake can acutally be used to make some very expensive, usefull things.

If you did want to use the skin for something, how would you do it? Who could do it for you?


Disclaimer! This thread is NOT talking about killing a snake for its skin. I am ONLY talking about what to do with an already dead snake.

[DutchHerp]

I don't think there's ANYTHING wrong with it. I mean, I can understand why people want to pay respects for their loved creatures, but the snakes are really not going to care.

If any of mine die, knock on wood, I will probably not do anything to it, but I don't frown upon people who keep their skins and make something of it.

IF I were to do something with it, I'd skin it and just keep the skin, just so that the snake would always be with me. Maybe get a nice wallet too, so I always have him on me.

[anatess]

Hopefully you're not posting this because one of yours has died!

Personally, I think it is okay. Which is a cultural thing, I'm sure. I mean, growing up in Asia without waste management facilities, we have learned to "recycle" stuff. Okay, I'm going to gross out some people here - but even dogs, if it is freshly dead, it gets eaten. We've come a long way on dog meat - meaning, we don't kill a dog for its meat anymore - but, if it dies from natural causes, you can eat it. No, no, I wouldn't. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Which is kinda the same with my pet snakes, I guess. I mean, if it was MY pet snake, I would give him a proper burial. But, I wouldn't find anything wrong with other people "recycling" their snake.

So, yeah, I've seen somebody skin a snake before. It looked fairly easy. I might have missed some steps but from what I remember, the guy opened up the belly the entire length of the snake and used a big spoon to scoop out everything off the skin. This looked really easy, so the meat must come off easy enough from the skin, I guess. Then they soaked the skin in salt and vinegar. Then dry the skin indoors. Then tan to desired color. Then shake off the scales.

[Slim]

I wouldn't look too badly at someone who did this, but I don't think I would.

[Mike Cavanaugh]

For the record... all my snakes are alive and well!!! should be another 25 years or so before I am faced with this situation.

[python.princess]

I'm too squeemish to skin a snake- especially my own pet. But I wouldn't think bad of anybody else doing it. I think it'd actually be kind of cool.

[Slim]

I think it'd actually be kind of cool.

Wonder how much a Pied purse would go for

[Bruce Whitehead]

I have a pastel female hatchling posed and frozen and slated to become a chocolate mold...

And my partner is preparing an homage (art piece) to our rat Ginger (using her bones) with the help of a friend of ours that does FX for movies, specializing in human and animal remains.

Bruce

[Slim]

I have a pastel female hatchling posed and frozen and slated to become a chocolate mold...

Bruce

For the first time since I've been on BP.net, I'm actually speachless......

[Bruce Whitehead]

For the first time since I've been on BP.net, I'm actually speachless......

Heh... it won't last long