Chunk, a 1,200-pound behemoth with a broken jaw, swept the competition Tuesday in the popular Fat Bear Week contest — his first win after finishing in second place three previous years. The annual online competition allows viewers to follow 12 bears in Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve on live webcams as they fish for salmon, and then cast ballots in a bracket-style tournament that lasts a week. Chunk — known officially as Bear 32 — beat out Bear 856 for the crown. A glut of sockeye salmon fueled a memorable feast this summer for the contest, and more than 1.5 million people voted.
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Florida’s first bear hunt in a decade drew more than 160,000 applicants for just 172 permits. Hunt opponents submitted some permits to try reduce the number of bears killed. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission will award permits through a random lottery for the hunt that will take place in December. The permit allows a hunter to kill one bear in parts of the state where the bear population is deemed large enough. There are an estimated 4,000 bears in Florida. During the last hunt in 2015, more than 300 bears were killed in two days.
The brown bears on the Alaska Peninsula have been gorging all summer on an abundant sockeye salmon run. That means they will be maximum weight just in time for the wildly popular online voting contest called Fat Bear Week. Twelve bears will compete for votes in a weeklong, single-elimination, bracket-style tournament starting Tuesday at fatbearweek.org. The public can view the bears on live cams at explore.org. The contest showcases the resiliency of the bears, who pack on the pounds each fall at Brooks River in the remote Katmai National Park and Preserve to survive the harsh winter.
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Conservationists are suing to stop Florida from holding its first black bear hunt in a decade. State officials approved the plan in August despite strong opposition. The group Bear Warriors United filed the complaint against the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission in a court in Tallahassee on Wednesday. Attorneys for the group argue that the bear hunt scheduled for December runs contrary to the state agency’s own directives to conserve native species. State officials say they need to manage the growing bear population. A spokesperson for the state agency declined to comment.
The annual Fat Bear Week featuring gluttonous brown bears at Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve is back. Online voting for the fattest juvenile bear begins Thursday. The main event starts Tuesday, when organizers pit 12 of some of the largest brown bears on the planet against each other in a single-elimination, bracket-style tournament online. People can vote at fatbearweek.org after watching livestreams featuring the bears at explore.org. The contest started in 2014, and drew only about 1,700 votes from dedicated bear cam viewers. But the event has exploded online, and more than 1 million votes were cast last year.
A trail remains closed in Yellowstone National Park after a bear attacked a hiker. Park officials say the attack happened Tuesday on the Turbid Lake Trail northeast of Yellowstone Lake. The 29-year-old man suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries to his arm and chest. Medics walked out with the hiker, who was then taken to a clinic and a nearby hospital. It was the first bear attack on a person in Yellowstone since 2021. Park officials suspect it was a grizzly bear and not a more common black bear because of the animal's size, location and behavior.
A black bear was spotted last Friday in Cape Coral’s Westin on SW 57th Street, sparking both excitement and concern among residents.
Multiple surveillance cameras captured the bear roaming the area, leading the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission (FWC) to confirm that black bears are not uncommon in Florida.