Tanning hides and Penicillin Tea

I did a search on this and found some references to these two items I am posting on, but I didn't see anything where they explained how to go about doing it. If I missed something, I apologize!

Salt is a great spice and we use it for baking, seasoning, proper hydration and even tanning hides; among other things. In a long term survival situation we may need to make our own clothing from animal skins. Salt is the main ingredient in the most common method of tanning that I knew of but I got to wondering how to procure ENOUGH salt in the wild once TSHTF.

There are only two methods of possible salt procurement that I, myself, know of. (Feel free to enlighten me if you know others!)
If you live near the coasts, (I don't) you can probably finagle some way to evaporate sea water and get salt, and you can get salt from the root of a hickory tree by boiling the roots until the water is boiled off and salt crystals are left behind. (That's alot of work though for a little payout.)

So I was sitting around one night and I was wondering if there were any alternative methods to tanning hides besides using salt. I ran across this particular website that explained how to tan hides using the brains from the animal itself. Here is the SOURCE And here is the text from that site:

History

1.Since the Stone Age, animal brains have been used to tan and preserve animal hides. Frontiersmen wore
brain-tanned buckskin, as did General George Washington's troops during the Revolutionary War. The work
clothes of common laborers in 18th century America wore tanned buckskin as did the fashionable upper class
in Europe.

Features

2.First, you must scrape the animal skin to remove all fat and membrane. The brain of the dead animal is removed,
heated and blended into a brain-and-water mix called a slurry. After the animal hide is scraped and dried, the slurry
is rubbed into the hide and left overnight. The slurry is scraped off the following day.

Effects

3.The brain method of tanning preserves the animal skin and leaves it soft and supple enough to wear as a garment
and lasts as long as chemically preserved hides.

Misconceptions

4.Contrary to what many people believe, an animal hide preserved with the brain-tanning method does not have
a bad smell.

Benefits

5.Chemical tanning methods leave chemical residue in the animal hide that can transfer to your skin. Brain-tanned
hides have no such chemical residues. In addition, brain-tanned hides can be washed.


I thought this was a great little article and a real easy method of curing/tanning your hides so they don't go bad. While on this site I also ran across a small article on how to make a Penicillin Tea. How useful would this be in a survival situation when medicines can and will be tough to run down!! (Well, except for those of us who suffer from penicillin allergies, but hey, it's there for your family!) Anyway, it seems good but I was wondering if any of the gurus out there can confirm this method? I saw a post that says Penicillin is tough to make without a lab, but this method seems to suggest that largest hurdle you would face would be maintaining the correct temperature in the wild. Here is the LINK

And here is the text:
HOW TO MAKE PENICILLIN TEA
In the event the medical system collapses or the government does and the hospitals are swamped with dead or dying, antibiotics in a post disaster/war-torn environment will be worth more then gold. Here I will tell you how to make homemade penicillin tea which will be a life saver when someone becomes septic from a simple little scratch in a post modern medical society. First get some bread(preferebly wheat)and place it in a bag in a warm place. Once mold starts to form, tear it apart into smaller pieces but keep it together and let the mold cover all of the bread. Once it is covered in mold, break it apart and place it in a large pot with 2/3 full of water and put a lid on it. Now the water must be brought to 98 degrees roughly and kept there for about 3 days. A simple trick is use the sun, use a black pot and lid or spray paint it either or, and place it in the sun during the day (depending on your part of the world direct sunlight may cause the liquid to exceed 98F degrees killing the mold) then place it on a heating blanket, a heated stone from the fireplace which will have to be rotated out through the night or heating stone for reptile aquariums ect.... After 3 days you will have a dark brown stinky broth, now scoop out the larger bits and filter the rest through a towel or coffee filter. The brown liquid is a strong and nasty tasting penicillin tea. This can be stored in a cold cellar or frozen for later. If not frozen, ensure you filter it again should you need to use it cause more mold may have formed. Do not boil the mixture while making the tea, it will kill the mold that makes the penicillin, do not add sugar to try and hide the flavor which is quite nasty by the way as this will promote fermentation. Voila! penicillin tea! just drink 2 to 4 ounces every 4-6 hours until signs of improved health. This may take several days to get over a sickness, eating food and drinking plenty of water is crucial as energy for your body to fend off the ravages of the sickness. Also, you can boil spruce pine needles and make a pine tea in order to boost the immune system with vitamin C. Pine needles have up to 4 times more vitamin C then orange juice. That also helps stave off scurvy which makes your teeth fallout .

NOTE* Ensure that at no point that it boils. The penicillin is a secretion of the mold and releases into the water slowly.

NOTE**DO NOT STIR, JUST LET IT SIT!!!

You really have to fight your gag reflex with it, you can dilute it with more water to help weaken the taste as long as they are drinking the amount needed the 2-4 ounce tea can be diluted in a quart and that should help greatly.

Don't take it unless you get really sick, otherwise you may just harden bacteria already in your system making them penicillin tolerant. Also you will want to store it away from sunlight, your best bet is to freeze it until you need it. Otherwise just place it in the fridge in an airtight container by filling it to the top while it is warm and putting the lid on it. Place it in the fridge not freezer and as it cools it will create a vacuum seal. If intend to place in the freezer then only fill it 2/3rds of the way so it can expand.

NOTE* Which source is better to make penicillin tea? Bread, fruit or vegetable? The answer is bread (wheat bread to be exact), due to its increased surface area and the water's ability to get to the roots of the mold where penicillin is secreted. That and that fruit and vegetable molds can vary in type, some can give you gastrointestinal issues and fruit is more likely to make alcohol due to the fructose feeding the mold's fermentation.

You can tan a hide by peeing on it and rubbing it in. I don't know if you have to repeat the process or not.

reply to post by Magnificient


Yeah, I'm aware of this method as well. You have to save your urine until it basically becomes ammonia. That's saving alot of pee! lol!

thanks op, great find!

they say every animal has enough brains to tan its own hide..lol

reply to post by BaZooKaJ


Well, every animal but the human species, I'm betting. Lol

reply to post by SumerianSoldier


The tea is something I currently need.

I can't afford to see a doctor so that means no prescribed meds for me. Reason enough to try the tea but here's the thing,I'm allergic to pharmaceutical penicillin would I be allergic to this natural form of the same? If yes,do you know of another concoction that would work?

Thanx for the info either way.

reply to post by dezertdog


I honestly can't give you the info on the Tea, dezertdog. I saw the link to tea while searching out the tanning issue. I also threw that out there in the end of my post wondering if anyone can confirm the tea can be made and used in that manner. I'm allergic to pharma PCN as well so I'm operating under the assumption that it would be the same. But I'm looking at the fact that I have family that would/could possibly use it in the SHTF scenario. You never know though, there could be something they add in the purification process a body reacts to, I'm just not gonna take the chance.

I would be hesitant with the penicillin tea. There are thousands of types of mold and many of them produce toxic byproducts. Ergot for example, and it grows on bread too.
I just wanted to throw that out there for anybody that decided to try the tea.

That is really interesting about using the brain to tan hides! I wonder what exactly it is that's in the brain that makes it useful for tanning.

reply to post by dezertdog


If you're allergic to one, don't mess with the other. There's other drugs that you can probably take safely.

My mom used to by tetracycline at the fish store, when she couldn't afford the dr.s visit.I figured it couldn't hurt to stock up on that for an emergency situation.

Originally posted by BaZooKaJ
thanks op, great find!

they say every animal has enough brains to tan its own hide..lol

...except for a rabbit. They haven't got the brains needed to tan their own hide

"hare-brained."