Starting from Robinson Crusoe-Chapter 127 - 49: The World’s Best Seal (Part 3)

The entire seal skin is nearly two and a half meters long, and when spread out, it's wider than the bed in the dugout cave.

It's my first time skinning a seal, and no matter how careful I am, it doesn't quite make up for my lack of experience.

The head and four paws of the seal have some imperfections, and there's a noticeable notch on the back of the neck from a blow with an axe. Because it was laid out on the damp sand for too long, it got stained with grit, and it doesn't currently look very attractive.

However, if you stroke the surface of the seal's skin, you'll notice that this not-so-thick coat is actually divided into two layers.

The outer layer is short and glossy guard hair for waterproofing, while the inner layer is soft fur for warmth.

Moreover, because the seal skin lacks an undercoat, once removed, it doesn't feel as heavy as it does on the seal, instead, it's thinner than sheepskin, like a broad velvet blanket. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

"It's really good stuff, no wonder it's so expensive!"

Holding up the seal skin, stroking along the soft guard hair, enjoying its silky texture, Chen Zhou exclaimed.

Such a rare and quality fur would be a shameful waste if not tanned.

...

After skinning, the rest of the seal carcass is easier to handle.

With experience in processing small seal carcasses, Chen Zhou moved a bit more skillfully.

He neatly arranged the removed body tissues according to the categorization of subcutaneous fat layer, muscle layer, internal organs, skeleton, and head and paws. He completed the task before nightfall.

The island is hot, and no matter what, the cut meat can't be left on the sand; even if the seabirds don't mess with it, flies will lay eggs on the meat.

Chen Zhou planned to move the meat overnight.

The fat-rich parts were first stacked in the shelter, to be taken to the mountains later for oil rendering.

The edible fresh meat was placed in wooden barrels, with some river water poured in to soak. If there weren't enough barrels, he would quickly cut the meat into strips, rub them with salt, and hang them up, otherwise, within three days, the meat would rot and stink.

Removing the skin, guts, blood, and bones from two seals yielded about 300 pounds of oil-rendering subcutaneous fat and about 220 pounds of edible fresh meat.

For Chen Zhou, this was a happy problem to have.

Accustomed to hard times, suddenly becoming "rich," he kept his thrifty nature, not wanting to waste even a small piece of meat.

He tied Lai Fu beside the pile of seal meat to scare away the sneaky seabirds.

Carrying a lantern and pulling a cart, Chen Zhou worked all night, moving all the fresh meat, fat, bones, and internal organs to the camp.

The last trip ended close to dawn.

The poor cart, never having received maintenance or repairs since it was made, was worn through after a night of hard work.

The center of the broad wooden board now had an elliptical hole, and its only remaining value was to be split open for firewood.

After the moving job was done, Chen Zhou still had to move all the fat into the small tent where he once lived, to store it for future oil rendering.

Then he emptied several large wooden barrels, went to the river to scoop water, and immersed the fresh meat and internal organs in them to keep the meat tender.

Finally, Chen Zhou also retrieved the head of the large seal – it was a female seal.

Animal brain matter is a natural tanning material, and if the seal's head wound was left untreated, the brain inside would start to rot in a few days.

To prevent this from happening, Chen Zhou planned to scoop out the seal's brain matter and store it in a glass jar.

Of course, before putting it in the jar, he also needed to boil a pot of water to sterilize the glass jar.

There was still a lot of work to do, and it had to be done one task at a time.