guess the age

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Ashreve93
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby Ashreve93 » Tue Jul 24, 2018 1:04 pm

Grizzlyadam wrote:
Ashreve93 wrote:I just saw the jaws.. can you post a photo of looking down on the top of the jaw bones as well?

Thanks



Here you go, this should help. Didn't want to make it too easy ;)

Curious if anyone has experience aging jaws?


4.5
4.5
3.5

For me, after 3.5 it gets a little difficult. I have a little experience with younger deer, but I rarely look at a mature deer jaw. Someone else on here is a little better than me, but that photo most certainly helps! Number three is clearly younger than the other two. And number one may be 5.5 I'm real excited to see the results. How much longer do we have to wait? ;)


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magicman54494
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby magicman54494 » Tue Jul 24, 2018 4:59 pm

1: 5.5
2: 4.5
3: 3.5
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby CChunter2 » Wed Jul 25, 2018 12:53 pm

4.5
3.5
3.5
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magicman54494
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby magicman54494 » Thu Jul 26, 2018 2:22 pm

well?
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Grizzlyadam
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby Grizzlyadam » Fri Jul 27, 2018 4:51 am

magicman54494 wrote:well?

I'll post up the results later today if I can find the time. I want to add some pics and a little more of the story to some of these bucks to enhance the experience. Patience. Looking at the guesses I will say that no one got them all right yet, actually very few got any of them right ;)
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magicman54494
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby magicman54494 » Fri Jul 27, 2018 6:17 am

Grizzlyadam wrote:
magicman54494 wrote:well?

I'll post up the results later today if I can find the time. I want to add some pics and a little more of the story to some of these bucks to enhance the experience. Patience. Looking at the guesses I will say that no one got them all right yet, actually very few got any of them right ;)

Awesome, I went by body and rack in my guesses. I dont know much about tooth wear.
I also dont know where you are from which can make a huge difference. I know that there is a big difference between the deer I shoot in Mn and the UP of Mich. both in antler and body. They were all great bucks BTW. Congrats!
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Grizzlyadam
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby Grizzlyadam » Fri Jul 27, 2018 2:03 pm

So the first buck had one maybe two people guess correctly at 5.5 years old. This was one I had targeted the season before but never laid eyes on. Got some late season pics of him so knew he would be around next year.
Image
Wasn't sure how old he was but figured he was mature and was definitely on the top three of the hit list. While scouting post season I found his shed in a bed very near where I had spent some time hunting that season.
Image
I picked out a tree to hunt to catch him in that bed the next season and ended up killing him about half a mile away near a big doe bedding area in peak rut. He was a huge bodied deer and I guessed him to be peak size at 6.5 years old. I was off by a year.

The second buck was the main reason I started this thread. One person guessed 6.5, all the other guesses were less than that. He was aged at 9.5 years old! This was a buck that I had actually passed up 4 years earlier during bow season thinking he was still young. He had very short tines but was pretty wide then, I figured he would be pretty nice in a few years. The next season I hunted him with no success, but I did figure out where he was bedded right under my nose and I bumped him going in a few times. Out of curiosity I put a cam in that bed to see if he came back and got some pics of him late season.
Image
The next season I had a cam down in a funnel not far from that bed and got one pic of him in velvet at 7.5 years old.
Image
That was the last I saw of him until late 2016 in the rut, and killed him a little over a month later 100 yards from the first bed I found that he was using. We called him the ghost because he was so elusive after those first few encounters. When I walked up on him I knew he was very old, he had a huge head and a very long body. I have to find a pic of his skull next to some other younger bucks I have, it is quite an amazing difference. He was fairly thin that time of year with little to no fat reserves on him. I'm guessing he would have broken the 200 pound mark dressed out a month or so earlier. He lost a lot of weight. The first thing I noticed was that he had a very distinct odor like that of a nursing home or something. Almost smelled like mothballs. Even the meat had that taste to it, I can smell it even after making jerky out of it. Knew he was a senior for sure. I actually guessed him to be older than he was. What an amazing survivor, I hold a lot of respect for that old buck.

Number three was guessed correct by just a few people at 5.5 years old. This was a buck that showed up in November of 2016, never had seen him before then. He had a busted tine on the drivers side, so we thought he may have gotten the boot from wherever he came from by a bigger buck.
Image
We figured him to be a 3.5 year old with some great potential then. He offered my brother multiple opportunities a few days in a row but he elected to pass on him taking some great pictures and video instead. He was very predominant figure in the area after that so we had a feeling he would be easy to kill. The next season he was easily the best buck around and I put a lot of effort into putting a tag on him. On december 9th I finally sealed the deal on him from the same stand my brother had seen him from the year before. I figured him to be 4.5 but was wrong by a year again. My brother thought 3.5. He was the hardest to age for several reasons. First was that he was small bodied only weighing in dressed at 141. Maybe he lost a lot of weight during the rut, but he did have a deep puncture wound in the front shoulder that was filled with puss. So much so that I don't think any meat was salvageable from that shoulder. Also when caping him out in the shed he was hanging a foot off the ground where most other bucks were touching their nose to the ground. Maybe he was a runt or something. Either way he was sporting one of the nicest racks we had seen in years around here. Anything close to 140 is rare around here in the northern CT berkshires. He was a 137, my best to date.

So thanks for all the guesses, I threw in the jaw bones just to see if anyone saw something I didn't. They all look the same to me. I would figure a 9.5 year old would have few teeth left, but he was still sporting some healthy chompers. I have no faith in looking at molars to get an age on a deer after this. I'm going to make it a point to send out more teeth from now on because I believe that the only accurate guess I personally can make is simply if a deer is mature or not. It's fun to know the exact age and help put some more of the puzzle pieces together. I know some will question the results of cementum annuli, and I'm not going to claim its 100%, but it is proven to be the most accurate way to age deer that is available.

Thanks again all, good luck this season. shoot straight..
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby jman22 » Fri Jul 27, 2018 2:12 pm

Fun post grizz. Thanks for sharing the history. Never would have guessed that 2nd buck was that old!
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby Motivated » Fri Jul 27, 2018 2:14 pm

Very Cool! Thanks for the write up. Great job with those old bucks!

To bad they don't have birth certificates...
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby mipubbucks24 » Fri Jul 27, 2018 2:49 pm

Thank you, it just goes to show it is so hard to age deer by the rack, or the way they look, and even in this case the body weight. Those are all amazing kills and great mature deer!
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby BAS4109 » Sat Jul 28, 2018 12:51 am

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing this.
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby AfootTrack56 » Sat Jul 28, 2018 1:10 am

Wow!! That’s awesome! Thanks for sharing.
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby BighousePT » Sat Jul 28, 2018 2:23 am

What in that 2nd jaw picture is showing it is a 9 1/2 year old. I am curious and don't see it.
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby BAS4109 » Sat Jul 28, 2018 2:35 am

BighousePT wrote:What in that 2nd jaw picture is showing it is a 9 1/2 year old. I am curious and don't see it.


I think that is the takeaway, jaw aging is not even close to accurate. These deer were aged by cementum annuli which basically counts the year rings on a front tooth. Similar to aging a tree.

https://deerage.com/
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Ashreve93
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Re: guess the age

Unread postby Ashreve93 » Sat Jul 28, 2018 4:16 am

BAS4109 wrote:
BighousePT wrote:What in that 2nd jaw picture is showing it is a 9 1/2 year old. I am curious and don't see it.


I think that is the takeaway, jaw aging is not even close to accurate. These deer were aged by cementum annuli which basically counts the year rings on a front tooth. Similar to aging a tree.

https://deerage.com/


Jaw aging is inaccurate after 4.5 in my opinion. 1.5 to 3.5 is easy. Then the difference between 3.5 and 4.5 is minute, but distinguishable. After that its tough to say. Yes, its not 100% accurate, but you can at least tell if you have a mature deer. If you desire the exact age, there's no doubt deerage is the way to go.
It's not the destination, it's the journey getting there!


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