How old do you think this deer was?

(Frio County, TX)

Been hunting frio county since the late 80s. My initial gut feeling was 6.5 but if you're in the sandy part of frio county I'd round down to 5.5.

I would certainly say he is mature.

Old enough…

Nose and face say older than 6.5 imo. Nice buck.
Natural 12 pt? Can't see all of the right but interested in his score also. I'd rather put him on the wall than a 200 inch pen raised deer.

7.5

6.5+

Going by his teeth, 5.5 yrs. Dentine is wider but very little lingual crest wear.

Anybody that graduated with a degree in WFS from TAMU in the 70's - 90's spent a lot of lab practical time aging deer with jaw teeth using the "Severinghaus method". Bill Severinghaus was a biologist and wildlife manager in 1949 who developed the research on jaw tooth aging of whitetails. That's how we were taught to do it.
Its been my experience over my career that the Severinghaus method is pretty damn accurate up to 4.5 years. After that, lots of physiological and environmental factors can skew the aging of the teeth one way or the other and degrade the overall accuracy of jaw teeth aging.

Diet and environmental locale and range conditions can effect the accuracy of jaw tooth aging. Abundance of soft supplemental feeding of protein pellets and cottonseed, etc. causes much less wear on deer teeth than natural more coarse and rough natural browse and forbes. This will cause deer to appear younger by teeth aging than what they really are. (They will actually be older than what their teeth show)

In addition, as the above poster said, deer in very arid and sandy areas/environments often show excessive wear on their teeth causing them to wear out quickly which will make them younger than what their teeth show.
Consistent, long duration drought conditions, can also cause this as the deer will be forced to eat more roughage like twigs, old hard acorns, etc...again causing premature tooth wear and making the teeth aging give the false impression that they are older than what they really are. (They will be younger than what their teeth show)

There has been some thoughts that the only real way to accurately age a deer is by actual tooth extraction and looking at the "cementum" of the tooth roots. Similar to aging trees by growth rings, the layers of the cementum or "cementum annuli" can be counted.
However, recent research has determined that even this method is not much more accurate than the old Severinghaus method in some instances.
Biologist at Mississippi State have had some success in using the correlation of the dried weight of the eye lens to age deer but that takes some very expensive equipment and great knowledge to perform accurately.

Bottom line is that deer jaw teeth wear is natures way of causing death to old deer by causing them to basically starve to death by no longer being able to chew and digest food.

For a biologist to become fairly efficient at jaw tooth aging he has to gain a lot of "eyes on" of actual jaw teeth with known deer age data. This can only be done by lots of repetition and hands on doing it to gain credibility and confidence in aging. I've worked with and known biologist who age hundreds of deer annually by jaw teeth and they get pretty damn good at it.
In contrast, I have worked with and known some biologist that at most, age maybe three to four deer a year by jaw teeth and just don't have the experience to accurately do it.

Jaw tooth aging in conjunction with knowledgeable "on the hoof" aging will net you a pretty good idea of how old a deer is...taking into consideration his diet, and where he lives and what he eats.

Up to 4.5 years the Severinghaus method is pretty damn accurate if done by an experienced biologist or deer manager. After that, imho, you should still be able, with experience and confidence, to be within a couple of years or so....taking into account his main diet and where he lives.

This is the easiest way to have a good idea on age. Most of our deer we've known for 4-5 years before we take them. We do have the advantage of large acreage and low hunter density however.

This is a picture of the same deer in 2023.

Been feeding cotton seed heavily for years, with planted fields as well and the property follows along a river bottom. So tooth wear can be deceiving compared to some rougher areas in the county.

Exactly.

This is something…..as I think I may have known their biologist back then. Gotta give the Mariposa credit for 30 years ago having nine consecutive years of pictures, with the then available 1996 technology of game cameras, on 45,000 acres of one particular cull buck.
They have a reputation of managing that ranch well.

If i remember correctly the ranch manager was Chris Daniels???? Had a guide named Marty maybe....been a while since I dealt with those fellers....

They didnt have game cams pics back then.... these were snapped and developed film pictures in hand from an old school film camera. They had boxes of paperclipped groups of pics.

Holy Moly. Was his name Marty Waldron? Thats some old school science right there. Think the biologist was Wayne Mercer or Merchant? I think he ended going to Louisiana or such. He wasn't an Aggie. If I remember he was a Tech or SFA grad or such. Probably why he couldn't age the deer right! .
Anyway, that's good bull for sure. Man this makes me feel old.
Tight lines sir.

Been a long time but I think you nailed it on all accounts....

my measuring stick is "is he mature" which for me is 5.5 plus. i've always thought it pretty easy to recognize a 4 year old versus a 5 year old

Teeth show 5.5 pushing to 6.5, no full dishing on any tooth. Body showing 6.5-8.5 at least. Neither looks or teeth are 100% so I would say a 6.5-7.5 year old best guess which is all we can do. That age is right where you should be shooting them. I would argue on many rough ranches 5.5 is the correct age for the most score, but that's an argument I never win but one which I've witnessed.