Tooth Study
The Arizona Antelope Foundation in cooperation with the Armendaris Ranch in New
Mexico, is undertaking a study to age harvested pronghorn antelope and compare their respective horn size and B & C score. In most antlered big game species, the older the animal, the larger
the antlers and the bigger the B & C score. That's proving to not to hold true with pronghorn, hence the study.
You can help us in the process by rough scoring your trophy and submitting a tooth for us to age. It won't cost you anything except some postage...mailing us a tooth and score sheet, and including a self
addressed stamped envelope if you want to know the results. Click here to print the tooth collection form.
After you harvest your trophy, the first thing you need to do is to make sure you pull the correct tooth. The best tooth to take is one of the middle incisors from the lower jaw (antelope do not have any
upper incisors). The best way to do this is to take a heavy knife or screwdriver and cut through the gums along the sides of the tooth. Once the tooth is loose, or you have cut deep enough, pry out the entire
tooth including the root. If you mess up, no problem, you have 3 more incisors to work with.
The second thing you need to do is make sure that the tooth gets placed into the tooth envelope you were provided at our Annual Hunter's Clinic, or simply put it in a small envelope with your name & address
on it. We can also send you one of these envelopes if you'd like one, email us with your name and address at info@azantelope.org and we can send you one. Once you've got your pronghorn tooth in the envelope, send it to us along with your name, address, phone number, state, game management unit, and any other pertinent information.
We also would like the rough B & C (or P & Y) green score. Scoring your animal, regardless of size, will add to the hunting experience. Green scores will be fine and all we need is the
length of the right and left horn plus the circumference at the base, circumference at 1st quarter, circumference at second quarter, and the circumference of the 3rd quarter along with the length of the prong
for each horn. The guide in the Arizona Trophy book or B & C book shows just how to do it. If you don't have a score sheet, you can get a copy from our website, or from the B & C website. http://azantelope.org/Hunter_s_Clinic/Hunter_s_Resource/hunter_s_resource.html
We can give you the age of your animal, but to partake in our study we need you to score your trophy! Data collected on the Armendaris Ranch and elsewhere show that the biggest bucks are those in the
2 to 6 year age categories. So staple your score sheet and tooth envelope together before you mail it to us. This will give us some meaningful results that will be useful in determining which age classes
to manage for, and how it may impact the various pronghorn herds.
Then, and this is important, encase the tooth envelope inside a regular envelope so that there is no blood or gore showing (we don't want the P.O. getting excited). Now, address and mail the outer envelope to
our P.O. Box 15501, Phoenix,AZ 85060-5501. You can also deliver it to one of our Board meetings too.
After the season, and after we have gathered up all of the envelopes, we will code each hunter to a number and send the paired data with the tooth on to the Armendaris Ranch and Mapston's Laboratory.
We will then post our results on our website, and if you've given us a self addressed return envelope, we'll give you your individual results.
If you have any questions, let us know...Congratulations on your success and thanks for participating in our study!
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