I've acquired a mounted deer head with a nice rack that has potential for a couple of knife handles and maybe a few other pieces. My question is how to get the antlers off.

I was hoping the antlers are screwed into the mount but in researching mounting techniques it appears the antlers may still be attached to a piece of skull and I may have to cut into the head and remove the entire skull plate. Then cut the skull away from the antler base to be left with a nice crown at the base of each antler.

Can someone with more knowledge on this confirm or advise on this?