I rarely have to deal with adipocere because I’ve figured out how to mostly prevent it. Preventing adipocere is a lot easier and less time consuming than removing it, so follow these instructions that way next time you won’t have to deal with removing it.
1. FLESH FLESH FLESH! Adipocere is produced when soft tissues (fats and other tissues) start breaking down, so it shouldn’t be a surprise to say that if you remove the soft tissues, you have less chance of adipocere being a problem! So grab a scapel and start slicing! My Maceration Guide goes in depth about the best way to flesh a carcass, so go give that a read if you haven’t already. My ligers (see photo attached above) came as mostly fleshed, salted carcasses but still had some meat on them. I chose not to hydrate them and further flesh them, which led to them having adipocere where the excess meat was.
2. Heat. Also mentioned in the maceration guide, heat will not only speed up macerating and degreasing, but will also limit adipocere. I’m not sure the exact science behind it, but from my personal experience and my fellow colleagues’, heat helps. It’s likely because maceration works faster when heated, thus removing the soft tissues/fats quicker, thus having less time for adipocere to form on the bones. I keep my maceration tank heated at roughly 110F (43.3C) and rarely experience grave wax. However, I macerated my 6 ligers in twelve 14-gallon barrels, so I did not have the chance to heat them, and they were covered in adipocere when they were done macerating.
3. Change out your buckets regularly! Adipocere is prominent in anaerobic (lacking oxygen) conditions, which can present problems for us because anaerobic bacteria is the main helper in maceration. However, when you first fill up the buckets, there is oxygen in the water. It is only after letting it sit for weeks that that oxygen has been used up and adipocere starts forming. If you change out your maceration buckets weekly or bi-weekly you’re much less likely to encounter adipocere.
If you combine these three tips, I guarantee that you will either no longer have to deal with adipocere on your bones, or you will have significantly less.
Who ever started this page, thank you!
That would be me! Glad these guides are being put to good use! Thanks for the support!
-Dalton from OddArticulations, LLC
This is awesome! I just noticed a bunch on a goat skull I thought was done degreasing, and was wondering how to get rid of it. Your degreasing guide was also fantastic. Thanks for the good info!
Hello Dalton
I have a few more skulls to macerated, your recommend 110F for less adipocere
What I have told is that any temperature ore 100F will kill bacteria, and slowdown the process
Is this true
Right now I have it 100F I don’t want take a chance
Thanks you very much for time
Hey Pasquale,
Right now I generally macerate at 108°F with zero problems. Any heat is better than none. Just never ever go over 160°F for any step of the process, as that’s the temperature that collagen melts and will result in irreversible bone damage. Bacteria usually dies around this temp as well.
Thank you for your time Dalton really appreciated ,I will follow you’re advice, I will keep the temperature at 110F
Thanks now I can fully clean the bones and get that grave wax off. Also do you know a way of killing the bacteria on the bones? Party Hardy
Fully degreasing (using soap, ammonia, or acetone) and then whitening using peroxide should kill off most of the bacteria