Tragic incident brings her sympathy: brown bear Grazer wins "Fat Bear" election

Anchorage (USA) - In the "Fat Bear" election in Alaska, it's all about the curves of the salmon eating champions. Did brown bear Grazerstand a chance against the massive males Chunk and 747, nicknamed Jumbo Jet?

With her impressive corpulence, the brown bear Grazer has done it again: the female bear with the conspicuously light-colored ears prevailed over the imposing male 32 Chunk in the Katmai National Park's "fattest furry animal" competition.

As in the previous year, these two colossi faced each other in the final round of the "Fat Bear" competition in Alaska. Grazer also won the title in 2023 with the number 128.

This "chubby" bear had worked hard all summer, raised a young bear and eaten salmon in order to successfully survive the winter hibernation, the park administration in the northernmost US state wrote on Instagram on Tuesday evening (local time). Grazer received significantly more votes (over 71,000) than her rival with around 30,000 votes.

The park in southwest Alaska is organizing "Fat Bear Week" for the tenth time. Six females and six males were in the running for the curious title for a week.

After six rounds of voting, only two contenders remained in the final on the online platform "Explore.org". More than one million votes were received from all over the world.

Online, bear fans were able to watch the contestants catch salmon on webcams in the rapids of the Brooks River, view before-and-after photos and vote for their favorites.

Finalist Chunk had grown fatter and more dominant over the summer, said naturalist Mike Fitz in a video chat on the "Fat Bear" website. He had simply boldly done what he wanted without caring about the other bears. Grazer was praised as "incredibly talented" at catching fish and as a fierce mother bear.

Chunk, with an estimated 550 kilograms of body weight and a conspicuous scar on his snout, stands out with his massive rump and low-hanging belly. He has been in the race several times, but has never made it to first place. Females weigh around a third less than male brown bears, but Grazer impressed with her colossal curves.

Grazer and Chunk had a tragic clash in the Brooks River in July while fishing for salmon. Two of Grazer's small cubs were washed over a waterfall, right into Chunk's fishing grounds.

He grabbed the offspring and injured one of the siblings so badly that it later died. Webcams recorded the incident. The footage also shows Grazer pouncing on Chunk in vain to protect her cub.

After Grazer was crowned the "Fat Bear" winner, the national park paid tribute to all the fat bears in Katmai on Instagram and thanked the salmon at the same time. "Without healthy salmon, there would be no healthy, fat bears," the post read.

With this curious competition, Katmai Park wants to inform people about the ecosystem and the habitat of the more than 2000 brown bears in the region and draw attention to dangers.

The area has some of the largest brown bear and salmon populations in the world. The rangers warn that it would be a disaster if fish stocks were to decline as a result of climate change, for example.