Now first I don't propose to be an expert. I have turkey hunted for years and each year I am taught new things! I do similar to Ma. spraying a bit of water is a good idea. However I do not trim any meat off. It does leave a knob to which I will drill a bit of my plaque out to help hold the tail in place onece dry.

But this is the method I have shared with my Hunter Education Classes.


Okay you have the tail cut at the thinnest point from where it is attached at the bird.
Cut through the spine and remove the tail. Set it aside.

Now I use a board about 3 feet square. A few drywall screws, two thin pieces of wood stripping, some table salt and a can of bug spray.





Drying Board picture


At the bottom of the above picture I have screwed in one drywall screw higher than the other two. I will center my tail on top of this. and use the other two screws to help spread the fan. I like to pull the very most bottom feather of the fan even with the bottom edge of the drying board. Or at 90 degrees. This works best on a fan that is unthawed and raw. If ya let the fan dry or the meat gets hard this will not work.


I amy trim a bit of meat away but not much. And not as much as other fan mount procedures tell ya to do.



Above I have placed the good side of the fan down facing the board . What you see is the backside of the fan as the bird would be walking away from you.

With the center (meat portion) on top of the 2 inch drywall screw I take the bottom feather of one side of the fan and push the feather stem up and over and behind the screw to the left as shown. This will hold it in place.



I then do the same on the other side and now the fan should be completely opened. If the fan is not opened like you eant it to - you may need to remove the center drywall screw and push up slightly on this portion of the fan and re-attach it. I then attach one wood strip to help hold the feathers in place and to keep the fan against my drying board. I may adjust a few feathers too before I screw this down. I use dry wall screws to secure each end. I then adjust my fan so the feathers are in place like I want it and tighten the strip down secure.



I then mound the table salt directly on the meaty portion (center tail portion) of the fan as shown.



I then spray this lightly with a bug spray. Place in a cool dry place and forget about it. I do this in a corner of my basement free from bugs, mice, animals, etc.



The beard I trim the excess skin away - not too much now and salt and borax this and put it in a cup meat side down. I wll set this on the tail board to dry.



When I mount the tail I will put a dab of hot glue on the meat end and insert it in my used shot gun casing that I used to shoot this bird.

I leave it set like this for about a year. During times I can remember I check the fan and may spray it lightly witht he bug spray again but really do nothing more.

Then I remove the wood strips - make a wooden tail mount as I don't buy them.
I take three peices of wood and make a "U" shape cradle that I can either hang on the wall or place on a fireplace mantel.
I measure the thickness of the tail at the dry salted meat poriton for my "U" thickness. I take about a 1/4 inch off this measurement as it will help hold the fan in place. I finish my wood mount front and I am done.

This picture is a piece of maple burl I used to shelf mount this fan.



This bird was shot in the fall so I have also added colored plastic leaves , my picture underneath, and hung a wingbone call from this bird along with the spurs and beard on the call lanyard.





Tis it!

JW