JorisVV Posted May 18, 2021 Share Posted May 18, 2021 I'm looking to clean 2 whale verts i found long ago. I am experienced with prepping mammoth and rhino teeth but not whale. Can anybody help me? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas.Dodson Posted May 18, 2021 Share Posted May 18, 2021 I've only cleaned encrusted fossils from a marine source like this a couple times so hopefully more experienced people weigh in, but... I had the best results removing encrusted material with air abrasion. Some of the stuff clings super tight and it wasn't very practical in my case to scribe it off. The shells and encrustations of many species are calcium carbonate based so perhaps a treatment with vinegar would work for fossils that don't have calcium carbonate replacement, presumably like this bone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ptychodus04 Posted May 19, 2021 Share Posted May 19, 2021 What tools do you have at your disposal? This makes a big difference in how you attack this. Regards, Kris Global Paleo Services, LLC https://globalpaleoservices.com http://instagram.com/globalpaleoservices http://instagram.com/kris.howe Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorisVV Posted May 19, 2021 Author Share Posted May 19, 2021 29 minutes ago, Ptychodus04 said: What tools do you have at your disposal? This makes a big difference in how you attack this. Right now I used a broombrush sort and a knife to clean some harder parts. It is going really wel and got 90% from the first one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AeroMike Posted June 4, 2021 Share Posted June 4, 2021 ok so I have cleaned verts and teeth with a 50/50 mix of white vinegar and distilled water. I let the vert/tooth soak for 4 hrs and then use plastic scrapers. I then let it soak and scrap...soak and scrap until clean. Here is a mastodon tooth for an example I cleaned. this took several cycles of soaking and scraping. 1 " This comment brought to you by the semi-famous AeroMike" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sjfriend Posted June 5, 2021 Share Posted June 5, 2021 Nice! Those look excellent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hadrosauridae Posted June 5, 2021 Share Posted June 5, 2021 11 hours ago, AeroMike said: ok so I have cleaned verts and teeth with a 50/50 mix of white vinegar and distilled water. I let the vert/tooth soak for 4 hrs and then use plastic scrapers. I then let it soak and scrap...soak and scrap until clean. Here is a mastodon tooth for an example I cleaned. this took several cycles of soaking and scraping. Wow, those are fabulous results. "There is no shortage of fossils. There is only a shortage of paleontologists to study them." - Larry Martin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now