I bought a big snake skin from Tandy a while back. I'm not sure how they tanned it but the skin side felt just like a thin piece of chrome tanned leather and the scale side was intact. I still haven't gotten around to using it on anything but I had plans to use it as an inset panel on some sheaths. I also got a ray skin from them I was planning to use on a knife handle. I was going to make a short Japanese style blade (the profile, at least) and try to make the handle using traditional materials. It will have to be another "one day" project.