Chapter 2433: Sonia (X)

"Let's start by repairing this marlin specimen," Sonia said, deciding to begin with the fish. The marlin presented the simplest repair challenge—not only saving time but also providing good hands-on practice for the apprentices.

The apprentices gathered around. As future staff of the Remote Survey Team and Natural History Museum, learning to make and repair specimens was fundamental to their professional training.

The marlin's main problem was skin cracking, caused by excessive drying of the leather. The first task was restoring the skin's elasticity.

Sonia used a duster to remove the accumulated dust from the specimen, then had her two apprentices carefully brush away surface grime with fine-bristled brushes.

"Leave the stubborn dirt for now," she instructed. "When we do the surface softening treatment, we can use water to remove it."

Once the dust was cleared, Sonia had the apprentices bring clean cloth strips. After soaking them thoroughly in water, they wrapped the entire specimen. This step allowed the skin to absorb moisture, softening it and restoring some of its natural tension.

How long this process needed depended entirely on the restorer's personal experience. Sonia had some experience repairing fish-skin taxidermy and set a timer on the specimen room's alarm clock.

"The skin still needs time to absorb moisture. While we wait, let's begin preparing a new specimen." She gestured to Dawen. "Bring collection specimen 171."

The specimen she intended to prepare was a bird recently collected from the Taiwan expedition: the Taiwan blue magpie.

She displayed a natural history illustration of the Taiwan blue magpie on the easel.

"This was collected in the mountains of the Taitung Longitudinal Valley. It's a species endemic to Taiwan Island. Latin scientific name: Urocissa caerulea. Classification: Neornithes subclass, Corvidae family, Urocissa genus, Taiwan blue magpie species. Everyone come closer to look—the picture is rather small."

The group gathered around as Sonia continued:

"In this natural history illustration, you can clearly see that the Taiwan blue magpie's head, face, neck, throat, and chest are all black. Yellow irises surround black pupils. The beak and legs are bright red. The visible upper body and lower abdomen are vivid blue. It has twelve tail feathers—the two longest have blue bases with white tips; the rest have black bases with white tips, arranged symmetrically. The lower abdomen and undertail coverts are grayish white. Its tail feathers are particularly long, accounting for two-thirds of the total body length."

"Like all corvid birds, the Taiwan blue magpie has a noisy disposition with coarse, clamorous calls. When flying, they generally proceed in straight lines, often moving in pairs or small groups. They're widely distributed across Taiwan Island, with specimens collected at multiple locations. They typically inhabit lower mountain forests and are rarely seen on the plains."

Sonia spoke with the confidence of an experienced university professor, though she had never formally taught classes before. She had mentored one apprentice back home, but only informally—after all, she had been too young for anything official. Openly taking apprentices would have given her guild colleagues an impression of arrogance. After arriving in Lingao, influenced and encouraged by Lin Hanlong, she had gradually begun teaching professional knowledge to others. Once she gained reasonable mastery of Chinese, most of her spare time was spent either taking or giving classes. Her teaching experience had steadily accumulated.

"This blue magpie is really beautiful!" a girl interjected.

"Indeed, the blue magpie's appearance is certainly striking. Like other corvids, it's quite intelligent. It can be domesticated as an ornamental bird—though its call is rather unpleasant."

"Then why doesn't our museum raise a few live ones? They'd be more lifelike than looking at specimens or pictures."

"And we wouldn't need to repair specimens..."

The apprentices, mostly female, quickly fell into lively chatter.

"Raising live animals is the zoo's business—we're not a zoo," Sonia said. "Perhaps one will be established in Lingao someday." She steered the conversation back on track. "According to observations from several expeditions, Taiwan blue magpies have fierce personalities and like to gather in groups, often moving in small flocks. When flying, they form a line. Flocked birds stay together year-round, are strongly territorial, and will drive away birds of other species that intrude."

While she spoke, Dawen had brought over the collection specimen.

The Taiwan blue magpie lay in a large lidded enamel basin. Sonia put on gloves and carefully transferred the body from the dish to the tile preparation table.

"Everyone can first observe the Taiwan blue magpie's physical characteristics, then compare with other Urocissa genus birds. Xiaowen..."

Xiaowen immediately displayed natural history illustrations of the other five blue magpie species—material Sonia had prepared in advance for today's lesson.

"Before making the specimen, we first measure its dimensions. The measurement standards for bird anatomy are as follows: body length is measured from beak tip to tail end; culmen length is the straight-line distance from where feathers begin at the beak base to the upper mandible tip; wing length is measured from wrist to longest flight feather tip; tail length is the straight-line distance from tail feather base to longest tail feather tip; tarsus length is measured from the midpoint at the back of the tibiotarsal joint to the lower edge of the lowest complete scale at the front of the tarsometatarsal-middle-toe joint."

She unfurled a tape measure and recorded the specimen's dimensions in sequence: body length 64.5 centimeters, wingspan 20.3 centimeters, tail length 39.7 centimeters...

As she dictated the numbers, Xiaowen began recording the production log.

"Before we start, we need to complete preparatory work—first, protective measures," Sonia said. "All birds and beasts carry parasites, bacteria, and viruses, some of which can be transmitted to humans. That's why we wear these white lab coats, gloves, masks, and other protective equipment. Please check your protection again."

Rustling sounds filled the room. Then silence returned.

"This time we're making a bird specimen. The collection specimen has already undergone seventy-two hours of low-temperature refrigeration and twenty-four hours of insecticide solution soaking, fully eliminating attached bacteria and parasites."

She spread the blue magpie on the preparation table.

"Now we begin the first step: separating skin from flesh. Please pay close attention."

She placed the sterilized, de-insected bird belly-up on the worktable, parted the chest-to-abdomen feathers to either side, then raised a sharp scalpel and made a decisive incision at the chest. The cut followed the midline all the way to the abdomen, creating a shallow surface opening.

"Note the depth when cutting—you cannot cut too deep, or you'll open the abdomen directly. Abdominal contents leaking out would contaminate the skin and feathers. The depth should roughly be just enough to open the epidermis. Stop about one to two centimeters from the anus."

She lifted the epidermal layer with tweezers, held the skin layer firmly, and bit by bit separated flesh from skin and fur.

"When skinning, technique must be gentle. With bird pelts, be especially careful. The appearance depends primarily on the feathers, so you must never damage them during skinning."

As the separation progressed, blood began flowing from the bird, along with excretions from the anus. Dawen stood ready, continuously dabbing with absorbent paper.

"Pay special attention to keeping things clean. Feather contamination affects the final appearance."

Sonia's fingers moved with agility and strength, her movements steady and swift, making the work look effortless. Where joints or adhesions were tight, she picked up the scalpel and separated while cutting.

Starting from the chest and abdomen, she worked toward head and tail respectively. At the shoulders, she first separated the wing-root skin and fur, used scissors to cut away wing-root muscles and the joint, then continued toward the wing tip until no muscle tissue remained, cutting bone and muscle together with scissors. At the legs, she first separated the leg-root skin and fur, used scissors to cut muscles and joints, then continued toward the front of the leg until no muscle tissue remained, again cutting bone and muscle together.

Near the tail, she paused temporarily, using absorbent paper to clean blood and fat from between subcutaneous tissue and muscle. Care was essential here—stripping too far risked damaging the tail and cloaca, causing tail feather loss and excrement and fat seepage.

She stripped only to near the tail root, leaving some muscle tissue behind, then turned to stripping the upper skin. Head skin was particularly challenging. She worked more carefully until the entire head skin and fur was stripped off, leaving only the smallest connection where the beak attached. Then she picked up scissors and cleanly cut right at the beak's base.

A complete Taiwan blue magpie bird skin now lay spread flat on the preparation table.

The apprentices had watched with intense concentration. At every critical point, they involuntarily held their breath. At such moments, the entire preparation room fell silent as a grave. When each challenge was successfully resolved, everyone exhaled together.

Sonia picked up the scalpel, cleanly severed the now fully skinned bird head, and placed it in a small porcelain bowl.

"If conditions permit, retain the skull. This way, when making the specimen, the head has a basic support structure with better restoration. But proper preservation treatment is essential." She used the scalpel to remove brain tissue, eyes, tongue, and muscle from the bird skull.

"Take this to boil and remove the flesh from the bone," she instructed Dawen. Then, picking up the pelt, she continued: "After the pelt is stripped, the second step is washing. Use soapberry powder mixed with clean water. That's all." She immersed the pelt in the enamel basin and gently rubbed and washed.

"Both inside and outside must be cleaned. Also inspect the skin layer—if residual muscle tissue remains, continue removing it. Be careful not to use too much force, or the feathers will fall off."

After washing, Sonia hung the blue magpie's pelt on a special rack in a shaded area to drip-dry naturally.

Stripped pelts easily lost moisture and hardened, affecting later work. They couldn't be left too long—stripping was typically done in the morning, and after washing and drying until afternoon, stuffing proceeded. It was already past 4 PM—she would have to work overtime again today.

(End of Chapter)