Mother bear Grazer surpassed the male bear – the enemy that killed her cub – with twice as many votes in this year’s fat bear contest in Alaska.
This year, Grazer mother bear number 128 maintained the title of most popular fat bear in the 10th annual Fat Bear Week online competition, according to CNN.
Grazer received more than twice as many votes as his competitor Chunk, number 32. He garnered 71,248 votes while the number of votes for his male counterpart was 30,468.
Explore.org organized online voting, recording a total of 1,041,124 votes (as of 9:30 p.m. on October 8, 8:30 a.m. on October 9, Hanoi time) in the week-long contest. The contest is organized by Katmai National Park & Preserve to raise public awareness of wild brown bears in Alaska.
Grazer and Chunk have a long history of rivalry. Grazer has a long, straight muzzle and prominent yellow ears. She is a very protective mother and has raised three litters. It is also greatly respected by other bears. In July 2024, both of its cubs, less than a year old, were swept away in Brook Falls, where bears in Katmai often gather to hunt salmon before hibernating. The rushing waters of the Brooks River swept the cub toward Chunk, now the dominant male bear on the river. Similar to some other large male bears, Chunk attacked the young bear, while Grazer tried to protect the cub. But Chunk still injured the cub closest to him before Grazer stopped him. The calf later died from its injuries.
The death of Grazer’s cub is not the only case of brown bear attacks. Last week, male bear No. 469 approached, attacked and killed nearly equally large female bear No. 402 on the Brooks River.
The Alaskan brown bear is the largest subspecies of brown bear in the world. They can eat up to 40 kg of food a day, including small mammals, salmon, berries and herbs. Adult male Alaskan brown bears usually weigh from 270 to 408 kg, but before entering hibernation, they accumulate fat and can jump to a weight of 544 – 700 kg. Female brown bears are significantly lighter, weighing only 2/3 of males.