Roadkill presents us with both a beautiful and tragic way to get close to the creatures that we share this land with and who are our brothers and sisters. 

 

Reclaim the skills of all our ancestors by learning how to take an animal apart, and to receive every part of its body as a gift, the way the grandmothers of your grandmothers did. We’ll also discuss all the particular questions relevant to roadkill, such as, “How do I know if an animal is safe to eat?” “How do I know if the hide is still good for tanning?” and “When I cooked a squirrel it tasted like rubber. How do you cook wild meats to make them tender and taste good?”

 

A basic premise of this workshop is that it is unethical to kill an animal for its hide alone. Working with roadkill can grant us the privilege of working with fur hides from animals which have suffered at the hands of the fur trade and need never be killed for that purpose.

 

Part I of this workshop in the morning is a lecture presentation. Part II, in the afternoon, is a hands-on workshop where you are invited to bring a frozen roadkill animal (coyote size or smaller - ie. fox, coon, possum, squirrel, rabbit, groundhog, snake, chipmunk, etc.), and we will take the animals apart together, learning from each one as we go.

Part II is optional. You also don’t need to bring your own animal if you would simply like to observe. 

 

**This workshop does not cover hide tanning, but only preserving a hide in preparation for tanning.

 

This workshop is an overview of many skills.

 

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Topics covered include:

 

When to pick up roadkill: seasons, location, safety, & practicality

How bodies rot: understanding the breakdown timeline & process

The art of skinning to save the hide

Determining the freshness of a hide

Preserving a hide for later tanning

Basic butchering

Organ meats

What to do with meat that has been crushed + gut explosions

Diseases, parasites, hygiene, & hype

The art of aging meat

Salting meat for preservation

Salt brining meats

Drying meat

Cooking wild meats

Understanding the difference in age: old animals versus young ones

Using other parts: brain, eyeballs, sinew, intestines, bone, fat, marrow, feet

Returning bodies to the earth, not the landfill

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