<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=windows-1252"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;">Dear Vasiti,<div><br></div><div>This is not an uncommon problem which I have encountered many times. Your specimen has ‘fat burn’ where a too-hastily-skinned bird has been mounted without proper removal of all fat bodies.</div><div>The fat slowly melts over the years and oxidises into fatty acid which burn the skin and cause feather loss. The only way I can deal with this is to remove loose feathers in a swatch, cut away the fat-contaminated skin and replace it with a layer of Gampi tissue and PVA adhesive. Once soaked for about 10 minutes in 70% acetone (diluted with water) - not too long or they will lose their natural oils, the feathers can be mounted back onto this tissue skin using the same adhesive. Similarly burned areas of feet and feet webs can be similarly replaced, coating the layer of tissue with PVA once the tissue has been adhered into place; this layer is then ‘engraved’ to replicate the skin scales and then painted and textured further as desired.</div><div><br></div><div>In haste.<br><div apple-content-edited="true">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;"><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;"><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;">With all good wishes, Simon.</div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;"><br></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;">Simon Moore MIScT, RSci, FLS, ACR<br>Conservator of Natural Sciences and Cutlery Historian,<br><a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.natural-2Dhistory-2Dconservation.com&d=AwMF-g&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=CLFZJ3fvGSmDp7xK1dNZfh6uGV_h-8NVlo3fXNoRNzI&m=lNeTzf7HQU7XKyY0ym6hpE0_Wj0T6mtDOGU46SGJT3g&s=l8ck7tEfQ5QFvC9yTglnCGDgLr4nWcivMdVakkhis0c&e=">www.natural-history-conservation.com</a> </div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;"><br><br><br></div></div></div>
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<br><div><div>On 3 Dec 2015, at 04:46, Vasiti Palavi <<a href="mailto:vpalavi@aucklandmuseum.com">vpalavi@aucklandmuseum.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div lang="EN-NZ" link="blue" vlink="purple" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div class="WordSection1" style="page: WordSection1;"><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">Hi All,<o:p></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">We currently have a situation with some of our historical taxidermied bird skin collections whereby there is fat leeching from the specimens. This is causing feather loss and degradation of the scales on the feet of the specimens which is of concern. Has anyone encountered this problem before? Are there any conservation methods that can be employed to halt this degradation process? Are there any relevant papers on this issue?<o:p></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">Any help would be appreciated<o:p></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">Thanks<o:p></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">Vasiti<o:p></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: gray;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div></div><p><font size="1" face="Arial">Auckland Museum Trust Board ("Auckland Museum") accepts no liability for any opinion contained in this email. The material in this email is confidential to the recipient named above. If you are not the intended recipient: please do not copy, use or disclose this communication; please notify us immediately by email </font><font size="1" face="Arial">or by telephone (64 9 309 0443) and then delete this email. Where this is a communication unrelated to the business of Auckland Museum, Auckland Museum does not accept any responsibility for its contents.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br></font></p><hr>This e-mail message has been scanned for Viruses and Content and cleared by<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><font color="#400080"><strong>MailMarshal</strong></font><hr>_______________________________________________<br>Nhcoll-l mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Nhcoll-l@mailman.yale.edu" style="color: purple; text-decoration: underline;">Nhcoll-l@mailman.yale.edu</a><br><a href="http://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/nhcoll-l" style="color: purple; text-decoration: underline;">http://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/nhcoll-l</a><br><br>_______________________________________________<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br>NHCOLL-L is brought to you by the Society for the Preservation of<br>Natural History Collections (SPNHC), an international society whose<br>mission is to improve the preservation, conservation and management of<br>natural history collections to ensure their continuing value to<br>society. See<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.spnhc.org_&d=AwMF-g&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=CLFZJ3fvGSmDp7xK1dNZfh6uGV_h-8NVlo3fXNoRNzI&m=lNeTzf7HQU7XKyY0ym6hpE0_Wj0T6mtDOGU46SGJT3g&s=TXTnpRIVykeU-ZfpFlgvnrNWVJ-6ajaXshKRDo9Jbk0&e=" style="color: purple; text-decoration: underline;">http://www.spnhc.org</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>for membership information.<br>Advertising on NH-COLL-L is inappropriate.</div></blockquote></div><br></div></body></html>