Jawbone Aging Education & Quiz

[dbHunterNY]

My pictures are a little lacking. I'll work on that as this goes on.

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[LET EM GROW]

2.5 yrold

[dbHunterNY]

Here's a 3rd deer. Post what you think for age. Again these were aged by a whitetail biologist that does this for a living across the nation and others in agreement.




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Notice it has all 6 teeth. Last premolar (3rd tooth back) has 2 cusps. There's very slight dentine showing on each cusp of the last molar. So it's at least 2.5 yrs old. Aside from chips though there's little wear on lingual crests. Dentine width on first molar (4th tooth) back is not as wide as the enamel all the way across. So this deer is 2.5 yrs old.

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[dbHunterNY]

Heres a 4th deer. Start with counting a full set of teeth. Then look for replacement of pre-molars. Finally start with wear (dentine width) on 4th tooth back, moving back to each proceeding tooth in the jaw.

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[Bowshotmuzzleloader]

Heres the other cheat sheet 

 

[dbHunterNY]

Heres a 4th deer. Start with counting a full set of teeth. Then look for replacement of pre-molars. Finally start with wear (dentine width) on 4th tooth back, moving back to each proceeding tooth in the jaw.

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It's the start of hunting season I get it but no guesses? Lol no worries there will be more. This deer was 5.5 yrs old. Dentine width compared to enamel is wider on all teeth (4th to 6th tooth) on the lingual tongue side in back. That means you add a year for each of three teeth starting at 2.5 yrs old.

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[dbHunterNY]

How about this deer. How old?

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[LET EM GROW]

3.5

[dbHunterNY]

3.5

So this is where people don't believe in aging deer. Keep in mind a fresh jawbone will have very distinct start and end to the dentine to easier tell. Dentine will be darker and not bleached. Anyway this deer was 4.5 years old. The 4th tooth back is clearly wider dentine than enamel. The next 5th tooth back is questionable. The last tooth is definitely not. Notice that progression and know it's sometimes easier to look at teeth before and after the suspect tooth. Also if you look at the last cusp of the back tooth it's starting to slope toward the cheek and worn more flat beyond a concave shape. There's dentine showing throughout the whole last cusp.

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[dbHunterNY]

By comparison look at this deer and I'll tell you from the start it's 3.5 yrs old.

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[dbHunterNY]

In theory we can go from 6.5 up to 8.5 by adding a year for each tooth that's cupped with no crest, starting with the 4th tooth back (1st molar, oldest tooth in deer). however, after 4.5+ most management decisions are kind of a moot point and we just call the deer old. If it's a buck and we care more about exact age for maybe peak potential or for curiosity of doe age we would then send teeth out for cementum analysis. At this point results start to vary though depending on region, genes, diet, and other things. Here's one that's 6.5 yrs old.


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[LET EM GROW]

In the 4.5 and 3.5 pics, the 5th tooth looks the exact same to me. hence the reason i went with 3.5. To me in this picture, the dentine doesnt look any wider than the enamel on tooth 5

[LET EM GROW]

I have 2 bucks on our properties that are both 8.5yrs old. Through history with them, I can garuntee 100% the age of one of the bucks at 8.5yrs, the other is 8.5 +- a year.. i dont have the saved picture history with him like i do the other. Only back to year 2012.. 

Would be nice to see their Jawbones if I or a "good" neighbor harvests one of them..  

[dbHunterNY]

definitely need to look at the jawbone as a whole and not focus on only one thing.  from here on out most won't be so clean and pretty but won't be as bleached either.  these were the ones one an educational display board we have.  being able to look at them in person does help.  i'll try to take photos of some ages next to each other.