Why This Year's Fat Bear Week May Have the Fattest Fat Bears Ever

This year's Fat Bear Week could see some of the biggest and fattest bears the competition has ever recorded thanks to a bumper year for salmon in Alaska.

The annual tournament, held at the Brooks River in Katmai National Park by explore.org, the Katmai Conservancy, and the park's own rangers, sees a dozen brown bears go head-to-head trying to snap up the most salmon and be crowned the fattest of the fat.

The brown bears of Katmai National Park are among the largest bears on Earth, with the biggest males often weighing more than 1,200 pounds at this time of year. The region is home to more brown bears than people and, every summer, they gorge themselves on oily fish to put on enough bloat to survive the winter.

After a bumper crop of salmon, this year's season is expected to be the biggest one yet.

"Pacific salmon are born in freshwater and spend part of their life rearing there before migrating to the ocean, where they take advantage of abundant marine food resources," Forest Bowers, Operations Manager for the Division of Commercial Fisheries in Alaska's Department of Fish and Game, told Newsweek. "They return to the freshwater where they spawn and the life cycle repeats."

This year saw more salmon returning to Katmai's rivers than any other year on record. "The 2022 Bristol Bay inshore sockeye salmon run was 79 million fish," Bowers said. That is 52 percent higher than the 10-year average for the area. "This large run is the product of careful fishery management and a period of high productivity in Bristol Bay lake systems where juvenile sockeye salmon rear."

Katmai National Park boasts one of the largest, healthiest runs of sockeye salmon in the world. "Alaska's fish stocks are generally very healthy because we have pristine habitat and are committed to sustainable management," Bowers said.

"There's no fat shaming in Fat Bear Week," explore.org said in a statement. During hibernation, the bears can lose up to one-third of their body weight and their winter survival depends almost entirely on these accumulated fat reserves.

Four-time champion Otis is a firm fan favorite. He is one of the largest bears on the planet, weighing up to 1,400 pounds. A skilled angler, Otis is renowned for his patience. Rather than chasing the salmon up the river, he chooses to wait for the fish to come to him. This allows him to preserve his energy and make the most of each meal. However, after years of wear and tear, he is missing several teeth and faces hairy competition from some of his younger opponents.

The knock-out tournament runs for a week and viewers can cast their votes online. The final will take place on October 11.