Nice. I haven't hunted around there. The place we hunt in South Texas has sand down by the river and clay up by the highway. Same aged deer have different wear patterns depending on which side of the ranch they live on. The place we hunt in Central Texas have older deer with less teeth wear than some of the middle aged deer from South Tx. The deer that use the food plots and protein feeders have less wear than and look younger than they really are in Central Tx. Sometimes the Central Tx deer won't have any front teeth or they are worn down to little bumps. We can usually only judge them to 5 or 6 unless we have a history with them. We know how old the deer is in the picture is because we've all watched his antlers get weirder as he got older until he went downhill and they just wouldn't grow right anymore.
Sometimes it's hard being me! But somebody has to do it.
Re: Age this whitetail. Jaw pic can be provided
[Re: JoSco]
#767989412/04/1910:05 PM
Our place is solid sand and we feed corn into it all year round. The deer show surprisingly little tooth wear. Buck my dad shot last year we had on camera for 4 years in a row. I thought he was 5 sent teeth off and they said he was 6. Looking at his teeth for wear most guessed 3 lol. Its far from a perfect science.
They favor one side or the other, some wear much more in the middle of the jaw than anywhere else or in the back etc.
Nice. I haven't hunted around there. The place we hunt in South Texas has sand down by the river and clay up by the highway. Same aged deer have different wear patterns depending on which side of the ranch they live on. The place we hunt in Central Texas have older deer with less teeth wear than some of the middle aged deer from South Tx. The deer that use the food plots and protein feeders have less wear than and look younger than they really are in Central Tx. Sometimes the Central Tx deer won't have any front teeth or they are worn down to little bumps. We can usually only judge them to 5 or 6 unless we have a history with them. We know how old the deer is in the picture is because we've all watched his antlers get weirder as he got older until he went downhill and they just wouldn't grow right anymore.
That is why I put zero faith in the tooth wear aging method. At that point, what does it matter, anyway? The deer is as old as it will ever be.
Re: Age this whitetail. Jaw pic can be provided
[Re: JoSco]
#768043512/05/1902:23 PM
This weekend I shot a fairly dominant cull buck in Lasalle County. Weak horned, but 165 pounds dressed weight. I knew he was at least 4 and maybe 5. The teeth told me 3.
Yeah, whatever. No way in heck that deer was a 3 year old. No way.
Re: Age this whitetail. Jaw pic can be provided
[Re: JoSco]
#768057512/05/1904:23 PM
I don't put much weight at all on tooth age, but ive never seen a young deer with tons of tooth wear. I feel like a lot of tooth wear is a good backup indicator or a mature/old deer. Almost none of the 4-5 year old bucks we have killed demonstrate a measurable amount of tooth wear difference from the younger deer. I always like to have photo history of our better bucks and several years to piece it together by and we still aren't right all the time. I sure like sending the teeth off to have them aged.
It's hell eatin em live
Re: Age this whitetail. Jaw pic can be provided
[Re: redchevy]
#768149212/06/1902:42 PM
Look at bottom jaw teeth wear. 4th tooth/ 1st molar
5.5, possibly 6.5 depending on diet. If he is a protein eater, could even be older. We have killed deer that we know are 8.5 that have 6.5 year old teeth.
High fence, low fence, no fence, it really doesn't matter as long as you're hunting!
Re: Age this whitetail. Jaw pic can be provided
[Re: titan2232]
#768175512/06/1906:41 PM
Nice. I haven't hunted around there. The place we hunt in South Texas has sand down by the river and clay up by the highway. Same aged deer have different wear patterns depending on which side of the ranch they live on. The place we hunt in Central Texas have older deer with less teeth wear than some of the middle aged deer from South Tx. The deer that use the food plots and protein feeders have less wear than and look younger than they really are in Central Tx. Sometimes the Central Tx deer won't have any front teeth or they are worn down to little bumps. We can usually only judge them to 5 or 6 unless we have a history with them. We know how old the deer is in the picture is because we've all watched his antlers get weirder as he got older until he went downhill and they just wouldn't grow right anymore.
That is why I put zero faith in the tooth wear aging method. At that point, what does it matter, anyway? The deer is as old as it will ever be.
You're from from alone. The tooth wear method is increasingly coming under fire and it's simply not reliable as it does not take into consideration a myriad of factors which can affect the determination. For $33 it's well worth the money to send in the two front lowers and get the actual age of the deer per cementum annuli testing.