Sunday past (Feb 22), we slaughtered another goat and packaged it, then stuck it in the freezer. We've done this before (there are photos in a previous post), but this time, I wanted to save the hide so that I could learn how to 'process' it. I should say, MIKE killed it, skinned it and butchered it.

It is currently soaking in wood ash and water after waiting the twenty-four hours in a pure water bath. I opted to tan it, versus making something with hair on it. The goat wasn't that purty and I just wanted to practice tanning a hide. No, I'm not pissing on it or using goat brains to tan it.

The process begins with the four or five day soak in the ash-water (produces lye) to get the skin off the hide. Then I will scrape the fat membrane and any remaining meat off the back of it, turn it over and then scrape the hair off of the hide, as well. The lye process softens the hide and allows me to take the fur off with a scraper.

The things that we need to do next time:

• Have two sharp knives, not just one.
• Make sure the goat is high enough to work on without breaking Mike's back.
• Figure out a hanging method that works. We used a branch of the tree in the backyard, but I was afraid it would break with the weight of a hundred-lb goat on it and us tugging the skin off and pulling it down in doing so.
• Make sure we always do this in colder weather.
  
• Keep hay on hand to cover the wheelbarrow underneath the goat so that when the guts are freed and tumble into the wheelbarrow, that they can be covered up with hay to keep the flies away.
• Keep the dog out of the backyard. She was a nuisance while we were working on the carcass.

Oh what fun we have! Last night, we put everything back into the tackroom after Mike sealed off most of the rat entryways. I suspect it's going to be a bit of a battle to keep them out of our feed.