Hey fellas, I'm a first time flesher. Done my first last night. It looked really good(didn't knock any holes in it) however, I did over flesh it. I thought I was doing a good job then when finished I found long hairs sticking through(mostly on belly area) then when I pulled them of course they came out. I was using the dull knife on the blue english flesher and it worked real well however, is there a way to keep from over fleshing? any advice is appreciated. Thank's, Brad

Bard depending on where you are in Ar, the coons are not fully prime yet and no matter what you do, you will have that. Sow coons worse than boars most of the time. But to over come this, just remove heavy fat. If you leave a thin layer of fat, and I mean real thin, it will kind of bead up, that will dry. But really, you most likly fleshed them right, they just are not good prime yet. I went through the same thing last year. By your Late Dec through Jan coons, you will see a huge difference. Hope this helps.

M. Howard, Thanks for the input. I'm hoping to get the December coons as in the past I've seen bad rubbed necks on them in Jan. It was my first fleshing and it was a fresh road kill so right now I'm not to concerned however I would be real concerned on hide #5 if nothing changes. Got into this fleshing to increase the fur check and I know a green hide will bring more than a poorly fleshed one. Thank's agin, Brad

Hey Brad, I did not think about it, but on coons, I don't really cut the fat off, but rather push it off. I do not use a sharp fleshing knife, in fact, all I use is a old draw knife tha is dull. The only cutting I do when fleshing coons is on the back of the neck where the hide is so think with grisle.

If you are scraping coon and have some trouble with the hair comming through the hide, you might be scraping over the same place to many times.
When scraping coon or any other animal it is best to keep your strokes to as few as possible. What happens is this, when your knife keeps going over and over the same spots that you have already scraped, it causes the leather to either stretch or get thin from you cutting into the leather to much in one spot. Try not to keep going over the same place to often. the belly on a coon is quite thin and easy to pull hair through. On the belly area , you need to let up on your scrapeing power a bit.
Always make sure that once you get a good line of fat moveing, move that line of fat all the way to the bottom of the coon till it comes off of the hide.

good advice Don...seems like i have heard all that in person.

keep the strokes to as few as possible to avoid getting reversible coons.