Populational variation of fluoride parameters in wild ungulates from the western United States

Abstract

Assays of mandibular fluoride were utilized to evaluate sex, age, time, geographic, and species specific fluoride accumulation in control Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep, mule deer, elk, pronghorn antelope, Dall sheep, whitetail deer, and Rocky Mountain goats. Samples were collected from wild ungulates in the western United States and fluoride concentrations in the various species were compared and presented graphically. Fluoride was found to increase with age class, but geographically separated populations of the same species accumulated different values of fluoride concentrations as a function of age, as did samples from the same population collected at different times. Population density variables and habitat type preference may be responsible for these phenomena. In addition, the mandible, rib, femur, metatarsus, metacarpus, and tibia-fibia of normal mule and whitetail deer were analyzed for fluoride and intraskeletal variations established. Fluoride was generally highest in the mandible, and decreased in other bones.