The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: mebnandtrn on December 05, 2017, 04:24:32 pm
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Google has failed me!!! We had to slaughter a jacob ewe, and the 2 horns are back from the abatoir, not attached to the head, just loose. How do we preserve them? I can't find the answer on Google at all, so any help gratefully appreciated.
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There is a thread on this here on TAS - sorry I've never been able to find things when I search.
You need to get the core out of the horn, unless the men pulled them right off, but even then they will need a bit of weathering. You can boil them up in washing powder, but we leave ours on a shed roof, well away from the house, for several months for the weather and insects to do their job. At the end of that time they will be clean and dry, but you might want to scrub them out inside with a bottle brush.
If you want to keep them whole, polish the outside with clear oil. If you want to make something such as jewellery, slice and polish. They will not be big enough to make a crook, for that you need an old tup with big strong horns.
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This is very interesting!
I didn't realise that you could get the horns back, is it just a matter of asking or do you need a licence?
It would be great to get them back.
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I don't think you need any licence. If you do then ooops! I just asked them for the skins and the horns and they said yes and charged me a bit more, but that was mainly due to needing to skin them perfectly so they make a good rug.
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Yes you need a licence. We were told we needed to fill in an AB117 form (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/approval-of-sites-using-animal-by-products-registration (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/approval-of-sites-using-animal-by-products-registration)), it was pretty painless, scanned in and emailed to them and a certificate given to us the next day via email. You need it for getting anything but meat back from the abattoir. We had to leave a copy with the abattoir in order to take the skins and horns away. We just used plastic storage tubs for them with 'Catergory 2 animal by-products - not for human consumption' written on with permanent marker.
We got some horns back in October. They are from castlemilk moorit ewes. We were looking into burying them, boiling them or putting them on a roof. I wasn't sure what to do so they sat in a dog cage by the back door (I was worried about things running off with them). They surprisingly didn't smell at all and within a month the first core had fallen out. I left them there seeing as it working as it was. We needed the crate to take some geese to slaughter last week so I took the horns out and inspected them. None of the others fell out but I tested them with a screwdriver and the cores were loose on 3 so I pulled them out. The last two still have the cores in and have moved to the conservatory/boot room/dumping ground. The door is always open there for the cats and we still aren't getting a smell.
There's not much fly activity at this time of year so it'll take a while but in my very limited experience you can leave them pretty much anywhere. I imagine in warmer months the smell might be quite bad though.
As to what to do with them once the core is out and they are clean - well, I haven't got that far!
Dans
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<<There's not much fly activity at this time of year so it'll take a while but in my very limited experience you can leave them pretty much anywhere. I imagine in warmer months the smell might be quite bad though.>>
Sounds as if the cores on yours just dried out in the sun Dans. Remember when you lived in Scotland? - no sun!! There are still flies though and it's them and the maggots which are the real problem for me and why I leave them as far away from the house as possible. I suppose if I was really well organised I could suspend the horns over the pond so the fish could eat the maggots when they dropped in :hungry: