Pudding-tonne bears

The Fat Bear Week returns as voters pick the biggest summer gluttons

- BY MARK THIESSEN

AFTER gorging all summer on sockeye salmon, the portliest brown bears on the Alaska Peninsula will battle it out to see who will be named the fattest of them all in the wildly popular online voting contest called Fat Bear Week.

Those casting votes online, which started yesterday, will choose between 11 mammoth brown bears and the winner of last week's competition for cubs, named “128 Junior.

She's a cub of “Grazer, the two-time defending Fat Bear Week champion at Katmai National Park and Preserve who is looking for a third title.

The contest, which began in 2014, aims to showcase the resiliency of the brown bears, who pack on the pounds each autumn to survive the harsh winter, mostly by gobbling salmon on the Brooks River in the remote preserve about 482km southwest of Anchorage by plane.

The public can watch the bears on explore.org’s livestream cameras before deciding on their favourite creature.