HOW TO FIND HIDES for hide tanning
SOURCING HIDES: WHO + HOW TO GET NICE HIDES
1. Do you want to skin animals yourself? If yes -
Cold-call small, family-run game butcher shops or domestic abattoirs. This is what my friend + mentor Katie did the first year I collected hides in Montana in 2010. We thought we could offer free deer skinning services to hunters but very few people took us up on that, and we wanted lots of hides; so Katie called around and asked, “can we skin in your meat locker for free and just keep the hide?” We found two butcher shops that said yes + it was on.
I've tried doing this in other parts of the world. It's not always a yes. I've been laughed at, I've had people shook. British Columbia game processors (where I live most of the year) were too afraid of possible food safe or labour issues (love you, Montana). Additionally, here on the coast there is a culture of skinning the animal in the field + most shops won't accept un-skinned animals anyway. This is where deer skinning services can shine (and why our attempt above didn't work). If local hunters need their animal skinned to take it to a shop, you can set up a “skinning station" to offer the service in exchange for the hide (and set up a tip jar!). Advertise on local hunting FB groups, on Craiglist, put an ad in your region's hunting regulations synopsis, hang a poster at Cabela's, etc.
Skinning deer simply to keep the hides has worked great for me for years to give me autonomy and the time to process (preserve) a lot of hides each season. But if you've got the time and there is a game processor near you, literally getting a part-time job as a skinner is how many hide tanners get their hides. Yes, you will need to start making your life revolve around hide tanning if you do this :)
2. Do you want to skin animals yourself? If no -
If you need someone to skin an animal for you, you need predictability and reliability, because you're a hide tanner + you're not about to go at your own craft at random. The first thing I think when sourcing hides from others is exchange. I rarely accept hides for free.
We live in capitalism. Most of us are not socialized in the norms of gift economies - the ancient systems of exchange that intertwine social ties with material culture. {If you'd like to immerse yourself more in that, read Marcel Mauss' theory-founding work, The Gift: the form and reason for exchange in archaic societies from 1925 here}.
If someone from a gift economy/mindset tells you, “I'll give you a hide,” there would be accountability embedded in their offer. If someone in a capitalist economy/mindset tells you “I'll give you a hide” - they've just disconnected themselves from any responsibility in the quality, timing, or follow-through of their offer. You might get a hide, once. It might be so low quality it's not worth tanning.
So, make sure you ‘pay’ for the hide. It can be a barter of goods, a service, or financial compensation. Make sure you offer something that actually feels like letting go. Then, allow yourself to have standards in asking for the quality of hide you need.
This is not just a logistics thing. It's a way to practice reciprocity. It's a way to build relationship. It IS the gift economy. We can start with each other, with the people we engage for the sake of our craft. And then we can extend that respect to our multi-species world. Leanne Betasamosake Simpson's storytelling in Our Treaty with the Hoof Nation is a story for all hide tanners.
Start with exchange in mind, and then look for hides in practical ways.
To find organizations that already process animals, look up farms, butcher shops, abattoirs, game processors, game farms (i.e. Fallow Deer). Look up Facebook groups of the same variety. Think about what you can offer that they may need (like, taking away the cut-offs and bones from an abattoir in exchange for picking up hides). Talk to them in person, before the busy hunting or harvest season begins. Explain that you're in it for the long haul and looking for consistency; and then be consistent. It might be worth it to them to only have you pick up all the hides; it might be that you need to pick up the hides on their very particular schedule. You may need to go out of your way
To find hunters, look up hunting groups, CORE or other hunting licence teachers/companies, hunting lodges (guide companies), hunter education programs, hunting supply stores with community poster boards, and any in-person drop-in groups centered on hunting. Put the word out hard. To get quality hides from them, show them Ron Nail's excellent tutorials on skinning deer properly. Offer a solid exchange that honours the time it'll take them to skin well.
Adapt + keep going.
The game butcher shops I mention above? One of them went out of business after 7 or so years. The second one closed this winter. Those folks were in business for over 25 years, of which I got to spend 13 amazing seasons skinning hides. The owners of the shop are like family; they have been a rock to me and many others. And this year, they won't be there. I will miss them immensely. And I will adapt + keep going. You will have to, too.