Aging Whitetail Deer

I was browsing the net and found this company for telling the age of deer by looking at a slice of the tooth root. Anyone ever use them or heard of them?

www.deerage.com

never used it. on qdma's website u can pay 20.00 and they send u insructions and shipping envelope. U send the tooth in and the age it. Supposed to be very accurate

Interesting. I've never heard of this method until recently.

Kansas used this method exclusively years ago but I don't know if they still do or not. It is the only way to get an accurate age unless the deer will talk to you.

this is the method the biologists use on our lease. it's very accurate.. much more accurate than tooth wear.

I agree with it being the best but friends have sent in known age bucks to be age by them and had some mistakes. It is not 100% but as said the most accurate. Tooth eruption and wear is the same way up till 4yr of age IMO after that it is iffy. You are correct unless that deer tells you before you shoot him it is up in the air after that. But one thing I do know once he is dead he is not aging a bit except in the cooler!

How did they know the age of the bucks? Did they watch them hit the ground from their moma... I doubt it. I know people say they see the same deer year after year, but how do you know they are wrong and not you... If it doestn have an ear tag with a number on it then Im not going to go around calling them the same deer. I agree that some are identified corectly like this, but trust a scientific method much mroe than somebody saying "ive watched him for seven years".

Toooth wear has nothing to do with this method of ageing. A tooth is sliced and the growth rings are counted just like counting the rings of a tree stump.

What I said. Just this method is the most accurate but still not 100%.

I entered a deer in a local contest in Uvalde a couple of years ago. The man that scored the deer counted the folds of skin at the base of the ear (between the base of the ear and the head) to determine age. I had never seen this before or since.

Same method used by Bill Carter on his ranch in Webb county for year now. Some claim it to be very accurate.

I have used them twice and been happy with the results of their service as they delivered results in the stated time frame each time. I have had two bucks whose teeth did not agree with what I was seeing from their body. Each time I had called the buck 5.5 and when I pulled the teeth they showed no wear or what I would call a 3.5 yr old on the wear spectrum. Sent off the teeth to these guys and both time they said 5.5 yrs old. I guess deer are like people, some have good teeth and some have poor teeth. If the body characteristics match what the tooth wear shows then I think we have the age of the buck accurate. If they are in conflict with each other then I send in the teeth for analysis and will go with the 2 out of 3 that match. It's all a guessing game and we just try to get it as accurate as we can.

funny I had a friend tell me about ear aging them that way, so far been on the money..but I haven't killed any thing under 4years though...

Have you tried it on any of your hunters deer?

No I have not. Once they are dead I just look at the deer and see if he looks the same age up close as he did thru the binos. I still use the tooth eruption and wear.

We have used them before and it has worked very well. They came back with the results we had pretty much thought. In one case we had a deer shot that wasnt supposed to be because he was too young and we sent it off to have the age determined. Deer came back as a 4 year old and the guy paid a fine.

Cementum annuli is the only accurate way to age a deer. The slice is so thin that it is microscopic. Toothwear is pretty accurate as well if you have practice and know how to do it.

To me aging deer on the hoof has 3 catagories
-immature
-mature
-old

If you want to get more precise than that you need experience with the particular herd the deer is coming from, know the individual deer and watch it for a few years, or have it tooth aged by cutting it. Tooth wear can be irradic too.

matt

Tell you what...you send me a tooth and $20 and I will tell you the age.

And untill you let me know how your determining the age, and prove to me that it works I'll have just about as much faith in your answer as I do that a fox is a good guardian for a hen house.

matt