Welcome Matson's Lab--Get your game lab-aged for free!

[robby denning]

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Hey all

I've been using these guys for 20+ years for lab-aging all my bucks and have introduced hundreds of hunters to their service. So it's an easy to introduce them to the forum: Matson's Laboratory

You'll hear their ad playing in the Rokcast (we did an episode based on their service here) and watch for @Big Sky Guy posting/answering questions on the forum.

As part of their introduction, they're generously giving away this prize package to three winners:

• A Gift Card for up to (4) big game animals lab-aged, a value of $75 each
• A Matson's Lab Hat (in white, black, or gray)
• and a Matson's logo'd can koozie for your Pepsi, Coors, IPA, Rockstar, or whatever Roksliders are drinking these days!

To enter, just welcome Matsons to the forum and post up what big game animal(s) you've taken that you'd just love to know the age!

We'll draw somewhere around 100 entires. 1 entry per person please!

 

[jcrain1970]

Nice!

 

[Billdoe]

That's pretty sweet. Welcome. Might need me an elk aged.

 

[huntnful]

Welcome matson’s lab!!

I’ve aged every buck I’ve killed for the last 5 years. But before I knew about aging, I killed this buck that had definitely spent some time on the mountain. Would have loved to know his age!

 

[WBT]

Welcome to the forum. I'd love to have some of the cape buffalo I've shot aged.

 

[HairyScandinavian]

Welcome!

I always wondered the age of a giant cow Elk I killed in Colorado a couple years ago. Her hindquarters were extremely difficult to get into my Elk sized game bags.... like worse than the worst stuffing tent/sleeping bag I've ever had the displeasure of attempting to get back into their compression sacks.

 

[JRay]

Welcome. My grandfather killed a bruiser of a buck in Colorado in the 80s that I’d love to know the age of.

 

[Axlrod]

Welcome! A Mule Deer my dad shot when he was a teenager.

 

[fish impaler]

Interested in comparing age on these southern CA bucks

 

[BRTreedogs]

Welcome Matson’s

I wish I knew about all my past animals lol.

Especially my dads big bucks from the 80s

But you aged 4 animals for me this year, my first. And it’s exciting.
I think im addicted

 

[Quercus]

Welcome. Are you guys able to report the age of a critter submitted by a state agency by year/license number?

Example: WY G&F pulls a tooth and lymph nodes at a check station. Can the hunter later query that from you guys?

 

[RMM]

Welcome, I have a few deer I would love to know the age of. One being a HUGE bodied 5 point that I purely killed because I was positive he was mature.

 

[wildwilderness]

Welcome! I have teeth from a couple whitetails that would be nice to age, one buck was going downhill antler size so would be nice to see what age that was.
2023

Killed in 2024 by my son and was smaller than year before

 

[graniteghost]

Welcome Matsons! I posted this buck in the “How Old Was He” thread already, but would have loved to age this buck. Unfortunately don’t have teeth from him anymore.

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Welcome. Are you guys able to report the age of a critter submitted by a state agency by year/license number?

Example: WY G&F pulls a tooth and lymph nodes at a check station. Can the hunter later query that from you guys?

Wyoming actually has their own lab (I *think* the only remaining state that still processes their own wildlife teeth) so any teeth pulled by their state agency are being processed there.

To answer your question for the states that are collecting teeth and sending to Matson's, no, we do not lookup an agencies ages and report those back to individual hunters. This goes against our data sharing policy as the data belongs to the client and is up to them to share (or not share) with whom they choose. Sometimes the ID's the states give us are the same the hunters have so we physically could. However, a lot of times the ID's we are given do not correlate to the ID's the hunter may have.

Seems like more and more states are reporting ages back to the hunters, which I think is great to foster hunter conservation engagement but is ultimately an agency decision and I also understand agencies not reporting the ages back because I'm sure they get calls and complaints when the hunters find out they shot 1 and 2 year old bears .

 

[bergie]

I’ve gotten my critters aged with Matsons the last few years but I did shoot a wolf I could pop a tooth out of and send in. I’m guessing real young but dunno if that means sub year old or sub two years old.

 

[Mountain_Life]

Welcome! I have a handful of deer that I've wanted to get tested from the last couple years after hearing about your service on Rokslide.

 

[Legend]

Welcome. You may need to hire more staff after advertising on Rokslide.

I will be aging a toothless old bull elk after this season!

 

[7Bartman]

Welcome. I've had several animals aged over the years and always eagerly await the results. I wish I could've had the black bear aged that I shot this past fall. I thought the DNR was going to provide me with the results as they took a tooth, but I never heard back.

 

[Jon Boy]

Welcome! Would love to have this one aged