Colorado Parks and Wildlife is overhauling how the state tracks and manages beaver harvesting, announcing a package of new rules set to take effect for the 2026-27 season. The agency said the changes are designed to improve the data wildlife managers gather on beaver harvest and to support a newly developed Beaver Conservation and Management Strategy, referred to as the BCMS.
One of the most consequential changes involves a mandatory check-in for recreational hunters. Beginning in October, hunters pursuing beavers under a small game license paired with either a furbearer harvest permit or a furbearer license must bring harvested animals or their pelts directly to CPW staff for examination. The agency said the requirement is intended to give wildlife managers sharper insight into the timing and geography of beaver harvesting across the state.
CPW Beaver Conservation Manager Kris Inman, quoted in an agency news release, said that direct submission of harvested beavers "allows us to identify and verify the location of each harvest." Inman added that accumulated fine-scale data could eventually "give a clearer picture of population and harvest distribution to help guide where we focus conservation, restoration, and translocation efforts statewide."
CPW also trimmed the length of the statewide avocational beaver season, cutting it by a full month; the season will now close at the end of March rather than at the end of April. A daily bag limit of two applies across all 17 furbearer species, beavers included, while the possession limit stays unlimited and beavers retain their classification as a hunted furbearer species.
The rule changes are anchored to a broader conservation agenda. CPW's BCMS is organized around several priorities, among them tracking population and habitat conditions, identifying opportunities to restore beaver populations, and establishing clear policy and procedures for beaver translocation. The agency highlighted the outsized ecological role beavers play along Colorado's waterways, noting that their dam-building activity helps moderate stream flow and keep water on the landscape longer.
CPW has posted the full BCMS report to its website, and how the mandatory inspection requirement will be administered at CPW offices across the state once the October season opens remains to be seen.