Visiting the chunky stars of Fat Bear Week at their home in Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve takes some serious planning.
Bear 435, also known as Holly, stands on an area of Brooks Camp known as the"Spit," in Bristol Bay. She is almost ready for hibernation.
Brooks has garnered international fame thanks to webcams that have been live-streaming from the park since 2012, as well as Fat Bear Week, an online tournament celebrating the bears as they bulk up for hibernation. More than a million votes were cast in Fat Bear Week ‘22, and 10 million people tuned in to the cameras last June through October.
“If you’re here, I think usually it’s because you really want to be here,” said Melissa Freels, an Oregon resident whose September visit marked her 12th trip to Brooks Camp. Although she can’t speak to those results yet, Lewis can say that “visitation has exploded” and that the combination of the bear cams and Fat Bear Week does seem be a contribution. On the bear-viewing platforms, people flock like paparazzi to ID and photograph the ursine A-list. Seeing 128 “Grazer” or 435 “Holly�� are ultimate bragging rights.
That meant we could never stay in one place for long; park rules require visitors to stay at least 50 yards from bears at all times. You learn that in mandatory “bear school,” which is required for all visitors at Brooks Camp, even seasoned regulars like Freels. Mike Fitz, a former Katmai ranger who created Fat Bear Week in 2014, writes about the worst Brooks Camp incident in his book, “The Bears of Brooks Falls” . In 1966 — before an electric fence was installed around the Brooks Camp campground, and rules around food storage weren’t strict — a camper was dragged from his sleeping bag by a bear. He was dropped after screaming and required five months of hospital recovery in Anchorage.
The bears at Brooks Camp are habituated to people, meaning they’re used to us gawking at them with cameras and fishing in their river. Bear management technicians, or “bear techs,” also “haze” the bears to discourage them from getting too comfortable around people. This ���aversive conditioning” may be as mild as yelling or clapping to usher them out of camp, or, in rare cases when bear behavior is deemed more dangerous, using bear spray or rubber bullets.
Rosatelli said he has encountered a range of Otis fans. “One lady was reading him poems off the Falls ,” Rosatelli said. “And she was definitely crying.” The issue goes beyond anglers and the river. Staff must constantly remind travelers not to approach wildlife for photographs throughout Brooks Camp. It’s the same bad behavior Katmai ranger Gil Molina saw working at Yellowstone National Park for a decade, but at a much smaller scale.
“Once they put the platforms in, people felt more secure,” said Russell, 77. “It’s easier now than it used to be.”
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