In addition to what monster tom just said:
I use one of those cut off coat hangers that you have for front legs and put through both eye holes until dry. Makes tagging a breeze. Might not work with some stretchers.

So this is where the different stretchers come into play.

That's a good idea bfflobo

Lots of good ideas coming out. We never quit learning !

Ken:

Nice work. Love the comments . . . its like "Putting Up Fur, By Committee." Lol

Bfflobo gave you some great tips to add length to your cats. I took a router and beveled the edges of my boards up in the head and neck area to squeeze a little more length out of them. Same with the nose end of the board -- round it off. I know it sounds sort of anal but when you have a cat that is 37", getting that cat to 38" plus can sometimes mean another $100 on a good western cat so its worth the effort.
There is also a trick to making your females look gender neutral. :-) It works. I had a high percentage of females this year and my sale average was just as high or higher than guys with more males than females.

Nice work overall.

2 guys to listen too are monster toms,,, and bfflobo couple of best in the country putting up cats

So which boards do you cat trappers prefer. I've been using top lot cuz I have 2 dozen of them, but would be open to getting better boards in the future.

I have made my own. Got the idea from Tom Krause. Instructions are in his bobcat book. I have adjusted mine some from his ideas, but mostly the same. Nose, face, start of neck of them is made of 1/4" stainless rod. Kind of like the wire coyote stretchers on the market. Have made them to be simular in shape as the Colorado Cat boards in head area. They are bendable so can be bent together for small cats or spread apart for big ones or coyotes. They kind of adjust themselves to fit the critter. Sides are wood like any other stretcher. Not always perfect but work for my way of thinking. Get good air flow up the pelt and face.
If I was to make more I might look at using a smaller diameter rod material. 1/4" is quite stiff. I am still experimenting and learning too.

X2

I use Otis Lathams (Coloradocat), ideas from Steve Wood, a couple with NAFA measurements. All these are tweaked to look the same. After this video and all the conversations, I’ll probably shave down the head area and maybe take some off the sides.

Very nicely done!!! Thank You.

I really think you did a nice job on the video. I could clearly see what you were doing, very good camera set ups and angles and the audio was just great in explaining what you were doing. I do the boraxing a little differently. I "shake and bake" it on in a garbage sack and use the same borax in the bag for the next cat.

You did good!

Ok good info. I got all the equipment to make boards here at the house if I could find the time. I could definitely fix the face area of my existing boards to get a better shape and gain some of the length in the head neck area. I would still rather buy some this off season to have ready though. So I'll need to contact Colorado cat and check his boards out. Have any of you used Cletis' coyote boards? They seem to have a similar shape as described in this post.

Thanks alot for the props on the video and audio. That's been my issue with learning to skin most times is the video clarity. There are a handful of videos that show the process but not many you can see so good. I had a YouTuber ask me about how I skin a cat for taxi so I am about to make another shorter video to show that process. I'll post it here next week sometime once I get it edited.