'Backpack' declared Alaska's Fat Bear Week winner

September 30, 2026

A brown bear nicknamed "89 Backpack" has been crowned the winner of Alaska's thirteenth annual Fat Bear Week competition at Katmai National Park. Backpack narrowly defeated female bear 910 in the final round with approximately 103,000 votes compared to 910's 98,000 votes out of over a million total votes cast globally. The competition celebrates bears that have successfully gained significant weight—sometimes up to 25% of their body mass—by gorging on salmon and other foods before entering their six-month winter hibernation period.

Who is affected

89 Backpack (the winning brown bear)
Bear 910 (the runner-up female bear who raised a biological cub and adopted niece)
16 bears total who participated in the competition
Holly (Backpack's mother and 2019 winner)
Voters from over 100 countries who cast more than 1.7 million votes
Katmai National Park staff and the US National Parks Service organizing the event

What action is being taken

The Fat Bear Week competition is being run by Katmai National Park in Alaska
Bears are gorging on food, including salmon caught with their jaws or paws, from June until mid-October
The National Parks Service is describing the competition as a "battle of size, skill, snack acquisition, and strategic loafing"

Why it matters

This competition highlights the critical biological process bears undergo to prepare for hibernation, during which they cannot eat or drink and lose one-third of their body weight. The bears' winter survival depends entirely on accumulating sufficient fat reserves before entering their dens for up to six months. The competition also raises global awareness about brown bear behavior and conservation, engaging over a million voters from more than 100 countries, making wildlife biology accessible and entertaining to a broad international audience.

What's next

Backpack will shortly enter hibernation, which can last up to six months.

Read full article from source: BBC