How to Process Deer From Beginning to End: An Ode to Buckskin

Join us on January 25th for Firefly Gathering’s Buckskin Sewing Workshop, where we’ll honor the Earth and reconnect with timeless traditions by transforming deer hides into beautiful, wearable buckskin.

Imagine being vegetarian for over a decade and transitioning meat back into your diet, only to find grocery store options expensive and disappointing. Determined to take matters into your own hands you learn how to raise chickens and goats for sustenance in the Appalachian mountains. As home butchering becomes your new obsession, you become aware of the vast amounts of meat left as roadkill as a result of car culture. What would you do? Would you pick one of these casualties up and dive into a whole new world of exploration?

Many people don’t trust meat production in the United States, believing it to be detrimental to the human who eats the mass produced, antibiotic-filled chickens, cows and pigs we’re sold in grocery stores and restaurants. In response, the creative people of Appalachia and beyond are using their own hands to find solutions to securing heathy food, while connecting to Earth, and even sourcing the material to make some of the coolest, most authentic and unique fashion you’ve ever seen.

Most mammals are similarly put together. When you take the skin off of animals, you learn a lot about how humans are built and how much we resemble our animal relatives. If you go deeper and learn to butcher, you’ll take animals apart into cuts of meat, like backstrap and tenderloin and experience an even stronger connection. 

Go even further and you’re taking the sinew off the back to sew durable buckskin bags and clothing; finding the needle bone in the front foreleg and using it to sew your buckskin with; completing the cycle and performing the art of sacred necromancy, bringing life back to the dead. What better way to approach an unavoidable part of car culture than honoring the animals that are casualties of our convenience? 

Buckskin is the product of a specific type of natural hide tanning process refined by the Native Peoples of North America more than 10,000 years ago. The finished buckskin material is softer and more stretchy than typical leather and can come from deer, moose, elk and other animals. Many people like leather, which is a more rigid material; but if you’ve never touched a buttery well-tanned buckskin, then you don’t yet know what soft is. Yes, leather is beautiful, but at Firefly we champion accessibility and sustainability, and buckskin is both. In Western North Carolina on a chilly 5am cruise down the road during hunting season a person can easily pick up 1 to 3 deer. They are disoriented and jumpy from getting shot at and often get hit by cars. Some mountain folks get most of their meat and hides for the year this way. 

If you’re excited and willing to  picking up animals from the side of the road, let your nose be your guide. If it says no, then listen. It’s helpful to keep a roadkill kit in your vehicle: a 5 gallon bucket for small critters, large contractor bags (because dead things leak), some inexpensive but strong pruners, a sharp knife, a sharpening stone (because hair dulls your knife fast), some rope just because, hand wipes and a couple of rags, leather and latex gloves, and you’re set. It all fits in the bucket and is useful stuff to have in the car whether you decide to pull over or not. 

At first the experience of taking animals apart is intense; peeling their skin off and working with the flesh. But really, anyone who eats meat should at least consider having a relationship with this process. Meat is a gift, and an intense substance. To be in touch with our food in a profound way helps us understand the impact of our actions and lifestyles.

PW buckskin

People who enjoy earthskills like hide tanning and working with Buckskin are relieved to meet one another at events like the Annual Firefly Gathering. It’s a breath of fresh air realizing you are not the only one curious and willing to learn new skills that can feed your family and clothe them, too. At earthskills events you might meet folks wearing buckskin from head to toe, seeing the way well made buckskin clothing ripple and move with the body when worn. Incredible! You learn little tricks to make the buckskin work for you like wearing the part of the hide on the same part of your body… it just fits better to truly wear its skin!

Taking a wet gooey slimy pile of flesh fresh off an animal and transforming it into a buttery soft, well smoked hide is truly one of the most magical and ancient alchemical transformations that tie us to the original people of the land we live on. It’s in all of our DNA. We have been working with animals to ensure our lives for millenia and we will continue to remember this art and teach the curious what we know.

Our yearly limited attendance Buckskin Sewing Workshop is coming up on January 25. All the Buckskin used in this workshop is deer skin, processed and brain tanned by our beloved expert garment maker and hide tanner, Rain Hall. Your imagination is the limit; Firefly Gathering co-founder Kaleb Wallace once made a beautiful set of juggling balls for his little sister with an intricate baseball stitch! Learn the basics and get creative at the Buckskin Sewing Workshop on January 25th. 

WRITTEN BY

Firefly Gathering

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Lily Harlin

Bookkeeper

Lily is an artist, creator, and dreamer. Since a very young age, she has been immersed in the natural world and draws heavy inspiration from the wild. Though her medium changes frequently, Lily’s art and expression always incorporate an element of the organic and unpredictable. She got her associate in fine arts in 2023, and now volunteers at her school as a ceramic studio monitor. She hopes to open a studio of her own one day to have a place to teach and inspire others. In addition to doing commission work, Lily has been creating many graphics for The Firefly Gathering since 2019. Lily grew up in the Earthskills community from the time she was eight years old, so having the opportunity to grow and give back in so many ways has been incredibly fulfilling. No matter where she ends up, this group of people and ideas will always hold a special place in her heart.