Category: Katmai National Park

Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

We officially have a Fat Bear Week champion, and she’s glorious

sudshr47 October 9, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

After consuming exceptional quantities of salmon this summer, Bear 409 “Beadnose” has triumphed as the 2018 Fat Bear Week champion.

She toppled a formidable contender in Bear 747, a dominant male bear whose enriched belly nearly scraped the ground. Read more…

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View More We officially have a Fat Bear Week champion, and she’s glorious
Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Massive bruisers go head to head in the last Fat Bear Week semifinal match

sudshr47 October 8, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

The Fat Bear Week finals showdown is nearly set: Profoundly plump Bear 409 (also known as Beadnose) awaits the winner of Monday’s semifinal showdown. 

The match pits two of the largest and most dominant Brooks River bears against one another: Bear 32 “Chunk” and Bear 747.  Read more…

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View More Massive bruisers go head to head in the last Fat Bear Week semifinal match
Animals Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Bear hibernation is a superpower, but it comes with a cost

sudshr47 October 6, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

Some bears hibernate in hollowed out tree-trunks. Some take a months-long rest beneath thick brambles and brush. Others dig into the hills to forge snug dens. And still others discover caves to hide away from the biting winter chill. Read more…

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View More Bear hibernation is a superpower, but it comes with a cost
Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

A famous matriarch bear is missing from Fat Bear Week. Where could she be?

sudshr47 October 5, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

A top competitor is missing from this year’s Fat Bear Week contest.

For a fleeting moment in June, rangers spotted Bear 410 — the oldest-known bear at Alaska’s Brooks River — walking up the chilly stream where the eager bears spend months snatching five-pound salmon from the water.  Read more…

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View More A famous matriarch bear is missing from Fat Bear Week. Where could she be?
Animals Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Which fat bear are you? Take this Fat Bear Week quiz to find out

sudshr47 October 4, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

Katmai National Park’s Fat Bear Week contest is now underway, with 13 very large omnivores pitted against each other in a playoff-like bracket. 

Each day, you can place your votes, but have you ever wondered which fat bear you would be if you lived in Katmai?  Read more…

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View More Which fat bear are you? Take this Fat Bear Week quiz to find out
Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Day 1 of Fat Bear Week voting pits an ex-champion against a young upstart

sudshr47 October 3, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

It borders on nearly inconceivable that any wild animal can grow so exceptionally plump over the course of just four months. But, it’s happening.

The voting for Fat Bear Week in Katmai National Park — where bears are blessed with a copious supply of sockeye salmon that allows them to fatten up tremendously before hibernating — has opened up, and there are two matches in play on Wednesday. Read more…

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View More Day 1 of Fat Bear Week voting pits an ex-champion against a young upstart
Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

An appreciation of Holly, the fat bear mom who adopted and raised an abandoned cub

sudshr47 October 3, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

In July 2014, a stranded bear cub spent the night clinging to the upper reaches of a spruce tree along the banks of the Brooks River in Katmai National Park, Alaska. 

After spending at least 24 hours curled up amid the branches, the young, largely helpless bear likely succumbed to thirst and hunger, and crawled down. Read more…

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View More An appreciation of Holly, the fat bear mom who adopted and raised an abandoned cub
Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Enormous Bear 747 may just take the cake as Fat Bear Week’s fattest bear

sudshr47 October 2, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

Over the course of just three hours in late June, ecologist Mike Fitz stood atop a bear viewing platform in Alaska’s Katmai National Park and watched Bear 747, a dominant male, consume 15 whole salmon. 

“That’s about 67,000 calories,” Fitz, a former Katmai ranger, said over email. Read more…

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View More Enormous Bear 747 may just take the cake as Fat Bear Week’s fattest bear
Bear Cam Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Who’s the fattest of them all? Get to know the fat, hairy bears of Fat Bear Week 2018

sudshr47 October 2, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

By the fall of each year, the brown bears of Katmai National Park grow exceptionally fat. The largest males, in fact, can tip the scales at more than 1,000 pounds.

This year, 13 plump omnivores have made it into the official Fat Bear Week contest, after park rangers selected the bulkiest contenders.  Read more…

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View More Who’s the fattest of them all? Get to know the fat, hairy bears of Fat Bear Week 2018
Bear Cam Bears Fat Bear Week Katmai National Park Science

Fat Bear Week is here: Your complete guide to nature’s most exciting competition

sudshr47 October 1, 2018

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Welcome to Fat Bear Week at Mashable! Each fall, Katmai National Park holds a competition as Alaska’s brown bears finish fattening up for their long winter hibernation. This year, Mashable is getting in on the salmon-munching action. Check back with us all week as we follow the fat bear face-offs each day, and remember to get your votes in for each round. Happy fishing!

For bears, getting fat is a matter of life and death.

It’s been about six months since the brown bears of Alaska’s Katmai National Park — the bears of bear cam fame — emerged from their well-dug winter dens. 

They’ve been munching on copious amounts of 4,500-calorie salmon ever since, putting on hundreds of pounds while thousands of people watched the bears’ fishing antics on the explore.org webcams over the summer. Read more…

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View More Fat Bear Week is here: Your complete guide to nature’s most exciting competition
Bearcam Bears Katmai National Park National Park Service Science

The matriarch of the Alaska bear cam makes her glorious return to the river

sudshr47 June 29, 2018

In 1989, park rangers first spotted Bear 410 as a small cub. 
Since then, she often returns to the banks of the salmon-filled river where she grew up. And again, nearly 30 years later, this old, remarkable bear has come back, claiming her status…

View More The matriarch of the Alaska bear cam makes her glorious return to the river