A recent study done in Florida used separate teeth from the same deer sent in to the lab to determine age of deer. Only 15% were classified at the same age, 50% were within a year apart, and the rest were classified as more than 2 years different image.

I believe they used incisors and the dark circles on the incisors as the aging criteria. They said the dark parts grow typically during the hard winter times and may not be useful as an aging criteria in southern deer with no real harsh winters.

Couple problems with this study were that the teeth were all aged at the same lab, also, just the incisors were sent, not a half jaw. So there are some limitations. But some food for thought...

It isn't all that accurate. That's all there is to it. People can believe what they want, but there's no way all deers' teeth wear exactly the same.

Like cows, sandy soils will wear teeth quicker.

Agreed. I remember reading a study in one of my wildlife management courses in undergrad that gave known-age deer jaws to multiple people with experience aging deer. The result was that the error rate was high for middle aged deer and got higher the older the deer was. The fact is, aging deer by their teeth, even using Cementum Anuli is not all that accurate.

we age our deer via tracking them on video, trail cam pics, and sight. When shot we check tooth wear and give the age we think he is. We then send teeth to lab - in most all cases we are within a year via all methods - not perfect but still is a good resource we think

There was a post on here a while back about a study where they gave known age deer jaws to several biologist to age. The error rate was really high.
We had a 4 year old that was tagged as a fawn, every "know-it all" from the lease next door said he was 7-8 years old. He was killed buy another buck that year. His teeth aged at 6-7 years.

That may have been me that posted that. Jimmy Rutledge was able to identify 85% of the tooth wear within one year. The other TPWD Technical Guidance Biologists were less than 50%. But, if you don't know the deer through observation and years of progression, it's the only thing we have. I've seen known age deer that showed 2-3 years more or less tooth wear than their actual age. All dependent on soil type and diet.

We look at all our jaws as part of our management plan. I don't put a lot of weight on the teeth other than young and ancient.

We have shot several deer in the 4-5 year old range that show little to no more wear than a 2 or 3 year old. And we have the years of consecutive pictures of the 4-5 year olds to know their age. I have posted a few jaws on here and always get a 2 and 3 year old estimate.

Im gona know how old or range of age a deer is before I see the teeth anyway.

When there is a heavy acorn crop that wears there teeth more also. Not a very accurate age guide....

We hunt in sand country with no acorns. Feeders throw corn into loose sand the deer eat year round and they show very little in the way of tooth wear until they get OLD!

After I shot this guy last season we went to take his front two teeth out to send to the lab and there were none! He had worn them down to nothing - we think he was 8-9 years old

Do you have his jaw or a picture? Would be interested to see what they look like. We shot two pretty darn old deer this year and have pretty much nothing to go by. Comparing them to the TPWD stuff we have its like 8+ on one and off the charts for the other.

That deer looks ancient. That's cool.