Bear and Mountain Lion
During mandatory checks Colorado Parks and Wildlife will extract and collect a small tooth located just behind either upper canine tooth. This tooth is sent to a lab for age determination. Hunters can help by making sure that the head is not frozen during the mandatory check and that the jaw is propped open before rigor sets in. Mountain lion and bear age data is provided online so hunters can look up the age of their harvested animal by seal number. This is the only way for hunters to find this information. For privacy reasons, hunter’s names are not posted.
Bear and Lion age results for the prior year are typically posted by late July or early August.
The results also include some animals that died as road-kills and other forms of mortality. The age is reported as an age class. This means a 0 = cub or kitten, 0 to about 9 months old, 1 = about 10 to 18 months old, 2 = about 1.5 years to 2.5 years old, and so on.
The latest 5 years of statistics will be maintained on the website. For older statistics, please make a request using the AskCPW form.
Statewide Moose
These moose tooth cementum age estimates are in addition to the ones posted below for Grand, Summit, and Larimer counties. Age estimates can be located by CWD Head Tag number or the last 5 digits of the hunter's CID.
Grand/Summit Counties Moose
Bull and cow moose hunters in GMUs 18, 181, 27, 28, 37 & 371 who participated in submitting teeth can check the links below for age results.
Larimer County Elk
Bull elk hunters in GMUs 7, 8, 9, 19, 191 & 20 who participated in submitting teeth during the fall can check the links below for age results.
Cementum annuli analysis results (bull age) are sorted by the last 5 numbers of individual hunter CID #s within each huntcode. Hunter CID #s are the 9-digit numbers assigned to each hunter and are shown on any hunting or fishing license.
For data older than the previous 5 years, please contact Joe Halseth, joe.halseth@state.co.us. Thanks to all hunters who participated in submitting teeth!
Mule Deer
A Southwest Colorado study was done on harvested mule deer bucks from 2007 through 2011 for GMUs 54, 61, 62, 75, 77, 78, 80, 81, 751 and 771. In 2012, teeth continued to be solicited from buck hunters in GMU 54 because managers in the Gunnison Basin are continuing to monitor population dynamics following the severe winter of 2007-08. See the long-term project results and 2012 GMU 54 results by visiting the Mule Deer Aging Project page.
The Middle Park area in Northwest Colorado, including GMUs 27, 181, 18, 37, 371 and 28, has 2011, 2012, and 2013 buck age-data available.
The purpose of the mule deer aging studies is to try to determine whether there is an optimum buck-to-doe ratio. Managing for that maximizes both hunt quality and hunter opportunity. The projects also help biologists examine how the age structure of harvested bucks changes in relation to winter severity.
