Deer Articulation

Throughout my project, I have decided Im going to be combining my love of taxidermy with my love of deer by articulating a near complete deer skeleton. I received it from ebay. Sadly it arrived in less than clean condition, so I had to spend the night cleaning the bones and deciding where they went.

As you can see, the deer isnt in the most clean condition ever.  When I unboxed it I concentrated on which types of bones went together, and laid it out on a table. After this, I then got to the first stage of cleaning, degreasing. Which required soapy warm water and an old toothbrush. When I had gotten all of the dirt and remaining flesh off the deer, I then focused on getting the parts put in order.

The first section I got was the cervical vertebrae, the atlas bone and the 6 bones behind it which make up the neck. The atlas bone attaches to the skull. The next vertebrae I figured out were the Thoratic Vertebrae, which make up the start of the spine, and are the vertebrae the ribs attach to. To the right of those is the Lumbar Vertebrae, which are the ones which cover the organs. They also have the sacrum (which connects the pelvis and the tailbone to the body) attached to them.

Once I had organised the vertebrae, the most important part of the skeleton in my opinion, I got to work with the other parts, the sternum, which goes opposite to the thoratic vertebrae, and the legs. The skeleton had gone through its first phase of cleaning now, and i bagged up each parts individually so it was easier for me when I got into college after cleaning them.