MAKING SKINS. 55 



damp weather in a room without a fire. Small 

 birds, like warblers, will set perfectly hard in forty- 

 eight hours in a moderate temperature with dry 

 air. Never allow a skin to freeze. 



Section III. : Making Skins of Long-necked 

 Birds. — Sandpipers, thin-necked woodpeckers, or 

 any birds, the necks of which are liable to become 

 broken, should have a wire placed in the neck to 

 support and strengthen it. Proceed in sewing the 

 wing-bones as directed in small skins ; then make 

 a body of cotton around the end of a wire that has 

 about an inch of the end bent into the form of a 

 hook, and then the body may be wrapped about the 

 wire with some of the winding cotton. The neck- 

 wire should project from the body for about the 

 same length as the natural neck, or a little more. 

 This neck-wire should also be wrapped with cotton 

 to the size of the natural neck, but rather thicker 

 where it joins the body. A small portion of this 

 wire which has been sharpened, as hereafter to be 

 directed, should project beyond the body. Now 

 place the body in position inside of the skin, forcing 

 the point of the wire into the skull, up into the 

 base of the upper mandible as far as it will go. 

 The heads of long-billed birds may be turned on 

 one side, but in this case the bill will be placed 



