Grizzly, 34, confirmed to be the oldest known to the Yellowstone area

JACKSON, Wyo (AP) – A 34-year-old grizzly bear captured in southwestern Wyoming has been confirmed to be the oldest on record in the Yellowstone area, Wyoming wildlife officials have said.

Grizzly Bear 168 was captured last summer after preying on calves in the Upper Green River Basin area.

The male had only a few teeth left and weighed 170 pounds (77 kilograms), just a fraction of the 450 pounds (204 kilograms) the bear weighed at age 5 when captured in the National Forest by Shoshone in August 1991..

Biologists learned of the bear’s longevity after euthanizing the bruin, which had attacked cattle and finally calves. Biologists were able to tell Grizzly 168 was responsible after examining the calves.

“You scratch them and there are terrible bruises, but there are no real punctures,” Dan Thompson, biologist at Wyoming Game and Fish told the Jackson Hole News & Guide.. “They have so much force in their jaws that they can kill an animal by erasing it.”

When 168 was captured it was reduced to three humps for the canines and no other teeth, making it likely that the bear would continue to seek out easy prey, such as calves, Thompson said.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service called for the bear to be euthanized last July.

Moving the animal, even if it had avoided a known conflict for decades, “would not have been the right thing to do,” said Thompson.

“It was sad we had to put him down,” said Thompson, “but ethically there was nothing else to do.

The bear was first captured at the age of 3 in 1989 when the inside of his lip was tattooed with the number 168. The bear was also captured north of Dubois in May 1996 and left drop his radio collar the following year.

While it is not known where the bear is in subsequent years, DNA testing indicates that Grizzly 168 spawned a litter of three cubs in 2005 or 2006, Thompson said. There is “good potential” that he sired another litter in 2009, when he would have been 23 years old.

“It’s not 100%, but based on the genetic evidence we have, it’s likely he bred as a 31-year-old male,” Thompson said.

Grizzly 168 outlived all the females documented in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem by four years, and female grizzly bears tend to live longer, officials said.