In a plot twist more suited to a soap opera than a popularity contest, Grazer clinched her second Fat Bear Contest victory on Tuesday, triumphing over the male giant who killed her cub earlier this summer.
Grazer outpaced Chunk by a staggering 40,000 votes, cast by fans tuning into live footage from Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve via explore.org.
Supporters voted online for their favorite hefty contender in a tournament-style bracket that started with 12 bears. They selected the bear they felt best embodied winter readiness through the fat reserves accumulated over the summer, feasting on the sockeye salmon returning to Brooks River
The contest runs every September through October, and has cams to watch the bears (
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The bears often position themselves at the top of a waterfall in the river, snatching leaping salmon mid-air as the fish attempt to leap the waterfall to spawn upstream.
This is where Grazer’s cub tragically lost its life after slipping over the waterfall and being killed by Chunk, arguably the most dominant brown bear on the river. Grazer battled Chunk in a desperate bid to save her cub, but it later died.
The heartbreaking incident was captured on the live cameras.
Another tragic death was caught live on camera just last week, causing a delay in the release of the tournament bracket for a day. Bear 402, a female bear slated to be a contestant in this year’s competition, was killed by a male brown bear on the day the brackets were due to be released.
According to her bio page on explore.org, Grazer captivates using her strikingly blond ears and elongated, straight muzzle. “She is a formidable presence on Brooks River. Her fearlessness and strength have earned her respect, with most bears avoiding confrontation,” the site describes.
Her other thriving offspring from her third brood clinched the runner-up spot in the recent Fat Bear Junior contest just two weeks prior.
Chunk is perhaps the hulking titan among the bears at the river, his dark brown fur, narrowly spaced eyes, and a telltale scar across his nose setting him apart, his own bio notes. This year, he climbed the social ladder due to his impressive size, snagging the coveted fishing locales.
“Chunk’s confidence and aggression paid off, allowing him to feast on 42 salmon in 10 hours,” the biography reads. “His physical success is evident in his bulky form.”
An average adult male brown bear tips the scales at 600 to 900 pounds (around 270 to 410 kilograms) in the heart of summer. But as the hibernation season looms and they gorge on migrating, spawning salmonconsuming upwards of 30 fish dailysome males can swell to over 1,000 pounds (454 kilograms).
Females are typically about a third smaller in size.
The annual competition, which last time around rallied over 1.3 million votes, is more than a contest; it’s an ode to the tenacity of the 2,200 brown bears residing in the sanctuary on the Alaska Peninsula, a land bridge reaching towards the Aleutian Islands from the southwest edge of the state.
Besides the live cameras, Katmai has turned into a must-visit tourist spot. Viewing stands have been constructed on the riverbanks to enable visitors to observe the brown bears as they fish for salmon.