Posted on 10/01/2020 7:11:18 AM PDT by SJackson

Bracket for 2020 Fat Bear Week (9/30-10/6) Now Available
King Salmon, AK Katmai National Park and Preserve, No capes are needed for these furry superheroes. They may not be faster than a speeding bullet, but despite the weight they are carrying, these burly beasts can still run faster than most humans. These brown bears power of packing on the pounds gets them through the winter and able to live to compete another year. With or without the lasso of truth around us, our story remains the same: fat bears = healthy bears.
While the plumpest of the plump work to gain even more, Katmais bears of Brooks River will compete in head-to-head matchups in Fat Bear Weeks single elimination tournament. Your votes decide who will wear the mantle of 2020s Fattest Bear. We are moving this voting from Katmai National Parks Facebook page to explore.org/fat-bear-week hosted by explore.org. Experience the excitement of survival of the fattest when Fat Bear Week 2020 begins Wednesday, September 30th! Matchups will be open for voting from 12 - 10 p.m. Eastern (8 a.m. - 6 p.m. Alaska).
Does Bear 747 have a chance to get his first championship by dethroning last years reigning champion, 435 Holly? Will a new bear come from the outside and topple the competition for the ultimate win? Can multi time champ 480 Otis reclaim his spot on top for one more year? While we cant foresee the future champion, we do know the paunchy bear will only achieve their win with all of you casting your votes.
This competition is brought to you through the partnership of Katmai National Park and Preserve, explore.org and the Katmai Conservancy. If you want to check out the live bear cams, you can find them here.
Ready to check out the competition for this years crown? Here is the 2020 Fat Bear Week Bracket for you to fill out! Then remember to come back to explore.org/fat-bear-week daily from Wednesday, September 30th through Championship Tuesday, October 6th. Remember, with great Fat Bears comes a great responsibility to vote!
I was expecting to see a video of a fat bear running off a cliff into a body of water.
They’re not fat, they’re plus size.
Still time to vote.
Still time to vote. Unfortunately no good pics of the bears on the links, other that results. The two winners so far. Social distancing not required.

Winners so far 151 and 812
How many hikers have these bears eaten?
How many hikers have these bears eaten?
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They’re more likely to have access/’eat’ fishermen than hikers! A friend of mine worked for the Park Service in AK for a couple of years - his job was to guard tourists sight-seeing the bears fishing .... he was armed and not with a handgun ... as the saying goes, he was “loaded for bear”!
Here in CT, we chase bear off our land with pitchforks. He not return.
A grizzly is kinda like (Mongo) in Blazing Saddles: you poke (shoot) one (him) with that and you’ll just make him mad.
“I was expecting to see a video of a fat bear running off a cliff into a body of water.”
When I lived in Alaska, I saw a brown bear have a moose in a relative small pond, and he ran around the pond for about a half hour, making the moose run to escape. He finally wore the moose out, and walked into the pond and broke it’s neck with one blow. Brown bears have a bad rep as killers. As a whole, the black bears are much worse up there. And unless a brown is feeding or a sow with cub, they generally don’t bother people. Blacks are aggressive.
rwood
One of our neighbors who lives near the bottom of the steep hillside took a picture of two of them in his back yard two weeks ago. They will not win the fat bear contest but it is a funny picture.
The most annoying thing the bears did this year was molesting our rasberry and blueberry bushes. I think that the blueberry bush is dead. They also pulled up our peas and green beans.
I just did a search and can see that the picture actually probably was a repost and not from the neighbor’s back yard.
Reposting text, because I can’t type.
“A teammate of mine posted to our group chat about this a couple of days ago. Here was my response...”
So inquiring minds want to know, how do the contest organizers get the bears to step on the scales? Strikes me that there is a Darwin Award chance right there! Any volunteers?
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