Need help aging this HC buck

[MASTERS]

Masters, does it make a difference if they eat off the ground or in a trough on teeth?

I can’t honestly say. Ours eat protein out of Lamco w/troughs and free choice out of down spouts. The corn is eaten off the ground. They eat a lot of both year round. Some months this summer they were eating 800# a day in our pasture.

I agree with chance that every deer is different, but the rocky country deer teeth don’t wear as evenly across the herd as well as the red dirt south Texas deer in my experience. Seems to bounce back and forth.

[Chance Love]

Some of the bucks we have photo history of have terrible teeth at 6-7 when killed and some of the ancient ones that slip through the cracks have fair teeth at 8-9. Hard to say how they will hold up teeth wise in the canyon country. I’m almost embarrassed to admit the amount of protein and corn we feed, as well as water we tote trying to keep them in decent shape in Blanco county.

What I'm hearing you say, is that teeth are not an accurate way to age a deer.

We are in rocky country also. The teeth almost ALWAYS are "wrong" on known aged deer. Like almost 100% of the time. Oh we still look at the teeth just to laugh at what the "book" says that deer's age should be. And I hunt a place down south that also gave up on the teeth thing YEARS ago.