No business like skull business
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TRIMONT - A lifelong resident of the Trimont area, Peter Owens has turned what started as a hobby into a full-fledged, expanding business.
Ever since his youth, Owens has been an avid hunter and outdoorsman. It was when he started looking to memorialize some of his hunts that becoming a skull mounter entered the picture for Owens.
"I had a couple deer I shot that I didn’t like how the European mounts turned out, so I wanted to start doing it myself. During 2021, we were trying to decide whether to get honeybees or flesh-eating bugs. We went the flesh-eating bug route."
To get the skulls in the condition he needs, Owens uses dermestid beetles. While it's not a pretty process, it is natural, as they are beetles that exist in the area, and it gets the job done.
"I have the bugs, I’ll skin the skull so it’s just a skull," he said. "I will put it on the bugs. The bugs will then eat all the soft tissue off so they’ll leave it down to the bone, and then I will degrease it and then whiten the bones. There’s no paint here. This is just whitened bone that is totally clean."
Owens said it is more common for places to boil or power wash the skulls, but using the beetles, it makes sure all of the nooks and finer details that can be damaged remain intact.
"They will clean all the soft tissue out of all the nooks and crevices of the skull," he said. "Because they start so small, they also won’t damage the softer bones, whereas a lot of times if people are power washing or boiling the bones, teeth can crack, and some of the more fragile bones can get damaged in the process."
At the beginning, it was all about getting better at his craft.
"I talked to other people who had done it, did a lot of research on my own," he said. "I took skulls like raccoons and smaller animal skulls to start working on those first."
For several years, Owens worked on a few small projects for family and friends, continuing to work out the kinks and develop his skills. Eventually, Owens felt he was ready to branch out.
"When I started seeing they could have one that stayed as a high-quality white for a large number of years, that’s when I really felt I was prepared," he said.
While the most common animal he works on is, no surprise, deer, there are other animals he has worked on several times.
"Texas Longhorn, elk or moose, bears, raccoons," Owens said. "Pretty much you name it, I've got fox in there right now."
One of the more notable ones Owens has been able to work on is grizzly bear.
"I know people who hunt in Alaska and that come back here frequently," he said. "They bring skulls back with them and ask me to do them. I've got aspirations like paddlefish or things that are more elaborate."
While he has been expanding his business for around a year, it wasn't until this summer that he branched out with a Facebook page for his services and a name, Full Rut Skullery.
"We decided to go with Full Rut Skullery," Owens said. "The deer are fully in breeding season. So that’s where that came from. The word Skuller is a made-up word. Scullery with a c would be a dishwashing or washing place, right? So, it’s a good play on words. Full Rut Scullery, cleaning skulls."
Through his business venture, Owens was also recently asked by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to be a business people could send deer to check for Chronic Wasting Disease. He went a step further, hosting an event at the fairgrounds to collect people's deer and check for CWD.
"I learned that their test days were going to be in Blue Earth, Sherburn and Madelia," he said. "That’s a big hole in Fairmont. I thought this would be inconvenient for people who live in Fairmont, the central area between the zones 252 and 253, to have to go somewhere else. I decided to do it that way, and it could also be a great advertisement for our business, and it just lumped together."
Looking forward, even though Owens has a full-time job outside of the business, he said he is looking to keep growing Full Rut Skullery.
"I do have aspirations of doing more taxidermy, stuff with hide, but I haven’t gotten that yet," he said. "I have aspirations of growing it further."
For more information, search for Full Rut Skullery on Facebook or call (507) 399-1502.