juvenile bearded dragon hibernating?

Question
I have a 1 year old beardie and we live on the east coast - it's starting to get pretty cold. 30 - 40's during the day. a few weeks ago our beardie started not doing too much, wouldn't come out of his cave during the day, etc... we changed his heat bulb thinking he wasn't getting hot enough. and then we started taking him out and putting him under the heat lamp. after a few weeks of this he came out on his own for a few days and about 4 days ago, buried himself under his tree and hasn't moved since.
i just want to make sure this is okay and we can leave him like this. also, how do we know he isn't dead when he's like this? is he too young to hibernate?
now that i think about it, he ate tons of food for abouta  month before he went into this tired not really hungry mode. this is our first dragon and we absolutely adore him and want to do right by him so please let us know your thoughts. thanks ever so much!
jamie

Answer
Hello Jamie, It does sound like he is ready to brumate, which is a type of hibernation for reptiles. They don't go into a deep sleep all winter like other animals do but they will sleep most the day and night to conserve energy. Only eating when they need to. They will awake and come to eat, drink, and bask then find a cool hiding place to sleep. Its perfectly normal and last about 3 months. He is not to young for this and actually its most common in males around a year old. It also happens with females and with all ages just more common with beardies like yours. If you want more information on Brumation in Bearded Dragons let me know. Good luck!
-Yex