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 age results for the prior year are typically posted in April or May. Lion age results for the prior year are typically posted in July.
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.