Found today...

[Jeffery Howle]

Found this today....What kind is it?.....maybe cow tooth??? :dunno:

[hudson]

Looks Bovine to me .

[Claycald]

I agree....bison tooth

[painshill]

Claycald wrote:

I agree....bison tooth

  All that's possible to say for sure is that it's Bovinae (100% certain), ie cow or bison. It isn't possible to determine it as bison from the tooth morphology. The stylid is prominent (applies to cow and bison) but not isolated (also applies to both). If the stylid were isolated then that would make it more likely bison, but not conclusively so.
Only context/associated skeletal remains or a preservation appearance that indicates it predates the introduction of cattle (ie it would have to be pre-contact) could determine it as bison. I would suggest it's more likely cow.

[sneakygroundbuzzard]

thats the one i misplaced as a kid so the tooth fairy didnt leave me any cash  :huh:

[orari]

Something looks "newish" about that tooth too.

[11KBP]

orari wrote:

Something looks "newish" about that tooth too.

  Personally I see nothing that suggests that the tooth looks “newish”.
As you say Roger, “the stylid is prominent (applies to cow and bison) but not isolated (also applies to both) …“I would suggest it's more likely cow.”
Out of curiosity Roger, what in your opinion indicates “it’s more likely cow”?
In the below image:
The upper tooth is a bison tooth.
The tooth in question is at bottom. 

[painshill]

[QUOTE]11KBP wrote:

Something looks "newish" about that tooth too.

  Personally I see nothing that suggests that the tooth looks “newish”.
As you say Roger, “the stylid is prominent (applies to cow and bison) but not isolated (also applies to both) …“I would suggest it's more likely cow.”
Out of curiosity Roger, what in your opinion indicates “it’s more likely cow”?
In the below image:
The upper tooth is a bison tooth.
The tooth in question is at bottom.   
  The mineral staining is - as you say - inconclusive. I take the cue for cow rather than bison (as a likelihood only) from the wear on the occlusal ridges. It's a permanent tooth from a mature individual. if you look at the edges of the ridges, they are generally quite angular and crisp. Compare them to the edges on your bison tooth which are rather rounded, with substantially more wear. That's what I would expect to see on an animal which has had a wild diet, eating coarse vegetation, rather than a reared animal which has been grazing on lush pasture (or in later times has been fed cattle cake/pellets/concentrates etc).

[Kyflintguy]

From what I can gather, bison were extinct in Kentucky (which I believe we're Jeffery found this if I'm not mistaken) by the late 1700's to early 1800's.  So some more information as to the context in which the tooth was found (may or may not ??) help provide a more certain answer.It Would be cool if it was a old bison tooth though... my guess, more likely a cow tooth.

[painshill]

Kyflintguy wrote:

From what I can gather, bison were extinct in Kentucky (which I believe we're Jeffery found this if I'm not mistaken) by the late 1700's to early 1800's.  So some more information as to the context in which the tooth was found (may or may not ??) help provide a more certain answer.It Would be cool if it was a old bison tooth though... my guess, more likely a cow tooth.

  Bison were still plentiful in parts of Kentucky in the 1780’s and the last wild bison reported to have been killed in the state was around 1800.
Cattle first appeared in Kentucky in the early 1780’s, via settlers pouring across the Appalachian Mountains – mostly “mongrel” breeds derived from British Devon (“Rubies”) or Spanish blood. In early times they were kept close to the homesteads and fed on wild switch cane. From around 1784 it became common to winter-feed cattle on shocked corn, leave them in pasture in the Kentucky glades for the summer and spring before reverting to corn until the following February. By 1786, there was the beginnings of a dairy industry with mongrel shorthorn breeds, and then British Herefords in 1817. In 1792 Thomas Goff brought bluegrass seed in bulk from Virginia, after seeing his horse eating the grass and that quickly became the norm for pasture feeding.
For bison confirmation, it would need to be demonstrably from a pre-1780s’ context.

[Jeffery Howle]

Kyflintguy wrote:

From what I can gather, bison were extinct in Kentucky (which I believe we're Jeffery found this if I'm not mistaken) by the late 1700's to early 1800's.  So some more information as to the context in which the tooth was found (may or may not ??) help provide a more certain answer.It Would be cool if it was a old bison tooth though... my guess, more likely a cow tooth.

  Yes It was found in Ky.....washed out high on the river bank...I would say were it was found it most likely washed out than washed up from river. many artifacts have been found in this area so it was a good spot for campsites throughout history.  And even when I first found this spot it had the remains of an old farm house on it and road going into it had a cattle guard ( the pipe kind) on the road. So I'm sure there was cattle on this land some time in the past..  Thanks all for your comments.  I guess no way to know for sure except by carbon dating. It was a single find...no other remains that I seen.  The area that is was found in the other guy calls it his Benton site because thats what he has been finding washing out at this time. But that does not mean that this tooth is from that period in time.

[11KBP]

painshill wrote:


The mineral staining is - as you say - inconclusive. I take the cue for cow rather than bison (as a likelihood only) from the wear on the occlusal ridges.

  That’s a possibility Roger; however, the difference in tooth wear could be due to the geographical location of the two different animals.
The top bison example is from a bison from the primary bison range in the Central Great Plains which fed on the tougher harder, often times dryer grasses whereas the tooth shown at the bottom of the image would be feeding on entirely different varieties of grasses which grow in a region with a much higher and a generally more regular rate of precipitation. I agree it's either bison or bovine but I don't believe I'll suggest one over the other, 
Note: I initially was thinking Jeffery was from Missouri and thought the tooth was from that region. However, I see now that it was found much farther east than Mo.

[Jeffery Howle]

11 KBP Wrote
Note: I initially was thinking Jeffery was from Missouri and thought the tooth was from that region. However, I see now that it was found much farther east than Mo.
From where I live in Ky....is not that far from Missouri...It is only about 40 miles to the Missouri line from where I live