Teeth Aging Texas Hill Country Deer

[Chance Love]

Just wanna see what all you experts and non-experts want to guess the age of these teeth at. Feel free to support your answers if you want. And have fun with this. I know a lot of y'all think tooth-wear aging is Gospel, and some don't. Most of you probably know my opinion on aging by teeth.

Deer #1, Low-Fence, Tx Hill Country:





Deer #2, Low-Fence, Tx Hill Country





Deer #3, High-fence, Tx Hill Country (100% native)






Ok GO!

[breederbuck33]

7
5
8+

(Plus or minus 2 years on all of them)

[D C]

#1 - 7/8
#2 - 4
#3 - 8+

Im no expert, but I want to learn more.

[rjtkdplus]

5, 3, really old.

[Dale Moser]

17!

[TexasTK]

What does winner get ?
My guess is all of them are 2-3 yrs older than what they show.

[3whunt]

In the words of billy bob...10, 10, a effing 10. All old

[flywise]

I think this whole tooth aging thing is crazy. Still not sure how it does any good
I like looking at their face in some Bino’s or at 10 yards. A lot can be told in an old fellas face.
As far as the teeth go......you have a set there in the range of 3.5- 5.5

[simek]

6+
4
6+

[MASTERS]

5
3
7+

[BernieH]

7.5
3.5
9.5

[texasdeerhunter]

I don’t think tooth aging is gospel, but regardless, we have to use it for MLD.
I think 6.5, 5.5, and really old 8+

[CastAndBlast]

Originally Posted by D C

#1 - 7/8
#2 - 4
#3 - 8+

Im no expert, but I want to learn more.

Agree...

7, 4, 8+

[RMW]

6
4
10

[txtimetravler]

Middle Aged
Young
Older than dirt

**define with some counties what your are calling TX Hill County

[8th1]

6.5
4.5
10.5

[buck_wild]

7, 4, 9+ since these are low fence jaw sets you BETTER have an exact age on these deer as in some how ear tagged as fawns if you are going to "tell" us how old they are later in the thread other wise this is a total waste of an exercise

[Coastal Ducks]

7
5
old enough

[jshouse]

in

[louieagarcia]

All I’m gonna say is that there not gettin any older!

[steve morton]

5,3 and 8.
Hill Country deer will fool you.
Might add a year to the first two.
I'm just guessing.

[GarGuy]

Yall pretty much know how I feel. History is the only way.

[Capt.Brown]

I feel so sorry for guys that get booted off a ranch because the teeth don’t meet a certain age requirement.

[GarGuy]

You kill that second deer on my place and your butt wont be back next year. Baby killer.

[SaltwaterSlick]

To establish meaningful data, you need to build your own database based on deer in the area you hunt based on known aged deer. Having said that, the jawbones pictured if typical diet and habitat, #1 would be in the early mature (5 1/2 year old) class, #2 would be in the middle aged class, (3 1/2- 4 1/2) and #3 is post mature (7 or older)... That's about a close as you can get from a blind set of specimens.

[lovemylegacy]

Deer #1 is older than deer #2 and deer #3 maybe older than me.

In truth, unless you have an ear tag in their ear, who knows?

[TwoHighways]

6.5
5.5
8.5

Tooth aging is by no means reliable past 1.5
Best used in conjunction with on the hoof photos and history

[Chance Love]

Originally Posted by buck_wild

7, 4, 9+ since these are low fence jaw sets you BETTER have an exact age on these deer as in some how ear tagged as fawns if you are going to "tell" us how old they are later in the thread other wise this is a total waste of an exercise

Hmmm, I "BETTER"? Your post made me chuckle a little.

Originally Posted by GarGuy

History is the only way.

Yes it is.



I like seeing all of the responses. Gonna wait for a few more, and then I'll weigh-in.

[txtimetravler]

What TX Hill county Counties are these from?

[kyle1974]

The more deer I look at, the more contradicting data I see. Honestly I don’t put a whole hell of a lot into it anymore. It’s interesting but far from accurate.

I’ll say that 3rd deer was a good kill, regardless of head gear. The other deer still had some life left... based on tooth wear.





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[Mtltx]

Seems to me that unless you have history with a deer, you really can’t tell the actual age of a deer or close to it based on tooth wear. My guess is that most hunters in this State hunt low fence properties and rely heavily on camera photos year after year and have a good idea of the age. Other than that it is based on body characteristics if there’s no photo evidence.

[Dale Moser]

Deer number 2 is 9+.


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[GarGuy]

Be interested in hearing TopOfTexas views on these

[ClayW]

I’ll play

6
4
8

[bbuck8]

5.5
3.5
8.5+

[Hix]

7
4
8


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[JeffK]

6,5,8

[bboswell]

Originally Posted by Capt.Brown

I feel so sorry for guys that get booted off a ranch because the teeth don’t meet a certain age requirement.

My wife proved that this year! She shot the oldest deer on the place and I shot a good older cull for the cape. Her jaws showed 3 while mine showed 7+

[ttaxidermy]

6.5
4.5
8.5
All just best guesses as I have no history with any of them..

[sasqy]

5.5
4.5
Older than 6.5

[SwampBuck]

I have hell with hill country deer. So now I just go off of my history and even then if I have a question I’ll bring it here.

I have one bucks in my pasture that I feel 90% confident on his age and that’s simply because he’s easily identified. (He’s missing a back hoof)

After that I try my best to Just make sure they’re mature. Luckily we are not heavily managed, although I wish it would be adopted.

[buck_wild]

[QUOTE=Chance Love;15395587]Hmmm, I "BETTER"? Your post made me chuckle a little.


Yes as in if you are planning to tell us the ages, it better be based on an exact known age, not some guess as to when the deer was 2 yrs and then someone tracked that deer for 6 yrs etc therefore the buck is x age old.
OTHERWISE, this is a total waste of time and energy. There, is that BETTER ?

[breederbuck33]

This thread got me thinking yesterday. I wonder how much a deer's diet really changes the wear on their teeth. East Texas deer tooth wear vs South Texas teeth wear vs Hill Country teeth wear. I bet they are all quite different.

[Chance Love]

[quote=buck_wild;15396367]

Originally Posted by Chance Love

Hmmm, I "BETTER"? Your post made me chuckle a little.


Yes as in if you are planning to tell us the ages, it better be based on an exact known age, not some guess as to when the deer was 2 yrs and then someone tracked that deer for 6 yrs etc therefore the buck is x age old.
OTHERWISE, this is a total waste of time and energy. There, is that BETTER ?

Well, you might not want to waste anymore of YOUR time or energy...

In fairness, one was "marked" as a fawn.

[JBJTX81]

I'm going
7
4
10

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[EZ-10RANCH]

Originally Posted by JBJTX81

I'm going
7
4
10

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Same here

[kyle1974]

Originally Posted by breederbuck33

This thread got me thinking yesterday. I wonder how much a deer's diet really changes the wear on their teeth. East Texas deer tooth wear vs South Texas teeth wear vs Hill Country teeth wear. I bet they are all quite different.

I see different wear on same aged deer from the north side to the south side of our lease.



north side has more sand in the soil, south and west is more clay/loam.

we see old (7+) year old deer in the western and southern areas that have wear like the 5 year olds do up north. pretty wild.

[slayr]

[quote=buck_wild;15396367]

Originally Posted by Chance Love

Hmmm, I "BETTER"? Your post made me chuckle a little.


Yes as in if you are planning to tell us the ages, it better be based on an exact known age, not some guess as to when the deer was 2 yrs and then someone tracked that deer for 6 yrs etc therefore the buck is x age old.
OTHERWISE, this is a total waste of time and energy. There, is that BETTER ?

Why you so angry?

[SaltwaterSlick]

Originally Posted by kyle1974

I see different wear on same aged deer from the north side to the south side of our lease.

north side has more sand in the soil, south and west is my clay. we see old (7+) year old deer that have wear like the 5 year olds do up north. pretty wild.

How you documenting that Kyle? You haven't had that place that long??

[kyle1974]

Originally Posted by SaltwaterSlick

How you documenting that Kyle? You haven't had that place that long??

with cemetum annuli testing to cross reference. Which still isn't 100%, but it seems to be more accurate than just guessing based on tooth wear.

This deer had a jaw that showed wear around 5 and the CA test said 7.