Preparation of small animal bone specimens by insect erosion method
There are many methods to make animal bone specimens, but most of them are time-consuming and laborious, which requires high technical requirements for the producers. Especially the bones of small animals. Insect erosion method is a relatively simple and effective method for making bone specimens. Although it was mentioned in previous professional books, it was not discussed in detail. I organized this method according to my practice as follows:
(1) materials: Tenebrio molitor, wire cutters, glass containers, fine copper wires, all-purpose adhesive, specimen bedplate.
(2) Reagents: bleaching agent and degreasing solvent.
(3) Production process:
(1) Erosion: The animal carcasses are put into containers containing Tenebrio molitor. The weight of insects is basically the same as that of animal carcasses. In order to accelerate the moth eating, the temperature should be kept at 65438 00℃-30℃. Tenebrio molitor likes to be dry, and humidity will cause a large number of insect deaths, so keep the environment dry and ventilated. Pay attention to observation every day, turn the animal carcass over, and let the soft tissues of all parts be eroded clean.
(2) Degreasing: The corroded bones can be degreased within one week by putting them into gasoline or xylene.
③ Bleaching: put the bone in 1% sodium peroxide solution for 2-3 days and take it out after whitening; When bleaching with hydrogen peroxide, the concentration is generally 3% ~ 30%, and the bone can be taken out when it turns white.
④ Plastic sealing: According to the size of bones, copper wire brackets can be selected or directly bonded with all-purpose adhesive.
(4) Summary
Tenebrio molitor is an insect that can be easily obtained in the flower and bird market. It has a wide range of sources, simple feeding and sanitation. Therefore, it is a good insect eater. Specimens are mainly eaten by insects to remove soft tissues, so bones can be preserved intact. The whole operation process is simple and convenient, and the technical requirements are low. According to the actual situation, we can also combine this method with the general "manual elimination method" to deal with the bone specimens of large animals.
Making method of animal stripping specimen
The preparation of animal skin specimens refers to vertebrates, that is to say, most species of vertebrates can be made into skin specimens, but in practical application, they are mainly suitable for mammals and birds, as well as other large species of various classes, such as whales, sharks, turtles, etc., and are not suitable for soaking.
There are many kinds of animals, and their external shapes, body sizes, skin conditions and so on are very different. In the production process, we must adopt different methods according to different situations. For example, birds are usually skinned from the abdomen, but cormorants can be cut from the back because of the fat in the abdomen and the feathers at the opening of the abdomen are easy to pollute. In addition, the process of making specimens varies from person to person, and there are many ways to make specimens. For example, when making bird specimens, there is a difference between cutting from the chest and cutting from the abdomen. As long as the specimen is vivid, ecological and realistic, it is a good work.
(1) Commonly used drugs
1. Arsenic trioxide (As2O3), also known as arsenic, is a white odorless and tasteless powder, which is highly toxic and has antiseptic effect.
2. Potassium aluminum sulfate [K2SO4 Al2 (SO4) 3 24h2o], also known as alum, is a colorless and transparent crystal, which has anti-corrosion and anti-scaling effects.
3. Camphor (C 10H 16O) has the function of preventing the specimen of insect column.
4. Boric acid (H3BO3) has antiseptic effect, but it is poor.
5. Phenol (C6H5OH) is also called carbolic acid and lysol. It has the functions of disinfection and antisepsis, and can prevent residual muscles from deteriorating.
(2) Preparation of preservative
1. Arsenic disinfection powder: mainly used for reptiles and mammals. When preparing, the arsenic, alum and camphor are ground into powder according to the ratio of 2: 7: 1 and mixed evenly.
2. Boric acid disinfection powder: It can replace arsenic disinfection powder, but it is worse than arsenic disinfection powder, but it is safer to use. Just mix boric acid powder, alum powder and camphor powder in a ratio of 5: 3: 2.
3. Arsenic antiseptic cream: It has the functions of antisepsis, insect prevention and feather protection, and is mainly used for birds.
(3) Common tools and materials
1. Anatomical tools: such as scalpels, tweezers, scissors, bone scissors, etc. Can be prepared according to economic conditions.
2. Woodworking and metalworking tools: such as wire cutters and vises. ? Head, electric drill and saw can be prepared according to conditions.
3. Gypsum powder (or talcum powder): It has water absorption function, and is mainly used to absorb the water of washed bird feathers. When peeling, it is scattered between muscles and skin to prevent adhesion and prevent blood and fat from polluting the feathers.
4. Lead wire: used for supporting animal specimens. Models with different thicknesses can be selected according to the size of animals.
5. Filler: mainly used to fill specimens, as well as cotton, bamboo silk, hemp knife, brown and so on. You can choose.
6. Glass artificial eye: It can be used to replace the eyes of animals.
7. Needle and thread: used to suture incision specimens.
8. Specimen table, branches, etc. : Used for fixing animal specimens.
9. Mark and record the name, sex and collection place of animal specimens.
(4) execution of birds and mammals
Living animals generally need to be slaughtered 1 ~ 2 hours before skinning, and can only be skinned after blood coagulation. There are several execution methods, which can be selected according to different animals.
1. Chest compression made him unable to breathe, his heart beat, and he died.
2. Air acupuncture. Inject a small amount of air intravenously into animals to block blood circulation, such as rabbits can inject it from the ear; Birds can be injected from the medial arm vein of their wings.
Step 3 drown. Can be used for mammals.
(5) Stripping bird specimens.
If it is alive before peeling, it needs to be put to death; If it is dead, the body should be examined as follows: whether the feathers are complete and whether the body is corrupt. It is very important to check whether the body is corrupt. The inspection method is: pull the feathers on cheeks, abdomen and crops hard, and use them only if they don't fall off.
Some birds were killed by bullets, and wounds and other places often shed blood or dirty things to stain their feathers. You can wash it with a brush dipped in water or detergent, then wipe off the water and sprinkle gypsum powder or talcum powder on the washed place. After the feathers are dried, gypsum powder can be brushed off to make them fluffy. If it is not completely dried once, it can be repeated again.
The skinning methods of bird specimens are basically the same (except for special species). Now, taking domestic pigeons as an example, the description is as follows:
Put the bird on the table and hold your head high. Separate the feathers of the chest to expose the bare hair area, cut it from the depression in front of the chest keel, and cut it straight along the skin to the center of the chest keel. The length of the opening should be slightly larger than the chest width of the bird. Beginners' openings can be enlarged appropriately, but not too large. It is difficult to deal with in the later suture and plastic surgery. The front end of the opening should be exposed to the neck, and then peeled off along the skin and muscles of the bird's chest with a scalpel, reaching the armpits on both sides of the chest. In the process of peeling, you should always sprinkle some gypsum powder on the inner side of skin and muscles to prevent feathers from being polluted by blood and fat.
Forward, use a scalpel to separate the crop from the skin and expose the neck. Hold the bird's head with your hands, bend the bird's neck to the abdomen, and then cut the bird's neck, esophagus and trachea together with scissors near the chest. At this time, we should pay attention to: ① The neck is completely cut from the skin, and do not cut the neck skin. (2) If there are blood spots, gypsum powder should be sprinkled in time to avoid blood spots polluting the skin. (3) It is best not to stubble. If you accidentally break the crop, you should pick up the bird in time and peel off the food in the crop to prevent the food from polluting the feathers.
Turn the bird over so that its back is up, then turn its head and neck over and peel the bird's back along the skin to reveal its shoulders.
Continue to peel off the humerus on both wings. Remove the muscles from the humerus and separate the humerus from the bird at the shoulder joint.
Continue to peel back the waist. When peeling the waist, the back and abdomen should be done at the same time. When exposing the leg, peel the skin all the way to the joint between the tarsometatarsal bones, remove the muscles on the tibia, cut off the upper end of the tibia, and separate the tibia from the bird.
When the tail is peeled off, the rectal floor is cut with a knife when the cloacal hole is peeled off; When peeling the tail, the tail fat should be completely separated from the skin and cut off at the end of the tail heald with scissors. After incision, the endodermis is V-shaped. Be careful not to cut off the shaft root of the tail feather to prevent the tail feather from falling off. At this point, the body muscles and skin have been completely separated.
Then peel the skin off the wings, pull out the humerus and peel it directly to the ulna. When you peel the ulna, because the root of the wing feather shaft is firmly born on the ulna, you should completely separate the wing skin from the ulna with your fingers close to the root of the feather shaft until you peel the wrist, and then remove all the muscles on the ulna and radius.
When making specimens of spreading wings, the wings cannot be peeled off by the above method. Because the feather roots on the ulna are separated from the ulna, when the wings are spread, the flying feathers will droop and cannot be opened because there is no support. Therefore, when making specimens of spreading wings, the skin should be cut inside the ulna to remove the muscles attached to the ulna and radius, and then sutured along the skin incision.
The wings are peeled off, and then the head is peeled off. Pull the neck first, so that the skin of the neck turns over to the head and gradually peels off, exposing the occipital bone. At this time, a taupe ear canal will appear on both sides of the occipital bone. Cut with a scalpel close to the base of the ear canal, or pull it out along the base of the ear canal with pointed tweezers. If you peel it forward, there will be dark parts on both sides, which are the eyeballs of birds. Use a scalpel to cut the eyelid limbal membrane, and use tweezers to take out the eyeball (be careful not to cut the eyeball and eyelid). At the same time, observe the color of iris when installing artificial eye, and color accordingly.
Around the occipital hole, use scissors to enlarge the occipital hole and cut off the neck. At the same time, cut the muscles along the medial sides of the mandible, pull out the bird's tongue, and remove the head muscles. Use tweezers to extend into the cranial cavity from the enlarged occipital hole; Clamp the meninges and take out the brain. In this way, the whole stripping process is completed.
Some birds. Woodpeckers and ducks, for example, have big heads and thin necks, so the bones of their heads can't be turned out from the skin of their necks, so you can cut off their necks first, and then make a small incision along the occipital bone from the outside (the size depends on the size of the bird's head) to turn the skulls out of their mouths, dig out the ear canal and remove the eyeball muscles. After removing the rot and installing the artificial eye, sew a small mouth.
After the bird is peeled off, it should be checked again. Muscle and fat attached to the skin should be removed. The gypsum powder scattered on the skin during peeling should be brushed off, and the skin accidentally cut during peeling should be stitched (from the inside).
After a bird's body is skinned, its skin must be treated immediately. In the process of antiseptic treatment, the feathered side will gradually turn back to the body surface and restore its original shape. Anti-corrosion and repair steps are as follows:
First, apply arsenic trioxide antiseptic cream (arsenic trioxide antiseptic cream) to the eye socket, cranial cavity and mandible, fill the eye socket with two cotton balls as big as the eyeball, install the artificial eye in a proper position, then apply the antiseptic cream to the inside of the neck skin with a brush, and gradually turn the head over (be careful not to pull hard to avoid the neck feathers falling off).
Secondly, apply antiseptic cream to the tibia of both feet, and wrap cotton on the tibia, big and small. The same as the muscles on the original calf; At the same time, the skin can be completely restored to its original state after all the antiseptic ointment is coated on the inside of the calf, tail and wings.
Thanks for adoption