Fat Bear Week: Why everyone loves it

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Fats Bear 7 days is an yearly level of competition, nay, celebration, of fat bears all over the place — although in this circumstance, seriously just the types in Katmai Countrywide Park and Maintain in Alaska. As the brown bears in the park get ready for hibernation, the bears gorge by themselves on salmon running by the Brooks River, which aids them obtain body weight and get all set for a winter of rest.

That usually means that for a brief moment in time, the park is crammed with body fat bears. And the park, in collaboration with Examine.org and the Katmai Conservancy, pits various bears versus every other in a playoff-esque bracket, in which body fat bear lovers vote on their faves, till a victor is announced on Oct 5.

The voting will come complete with photographs of the bears and their wintertime body weight, generally resulting in mass pleasure on the online as folks coo above the giant animals.

Past yr, the Body fat Bear 7 days website web site experienced 1.6 million visits, with about 650,000 individuals in fact taking part in the voting, a spokesperson for Check out.org told CNN. The two figures have steadily developed due to the fact the occasion begun again in 2014, at first just as a one day. This yr, the internet page is on keep track of to conquer both equally figures — and there are a variety of things at the rear of the week’s continuing attractiveness.

Most folks enjoy adorable chubby animals

The motive why the 7 days, and the fat bears, go viral each yr is really element of a lengthier lineage of well-known animal articles on the online, said Jessica Maddox, assistant professor of electronic media engineering at the College of Alabama. Photographs and videos of animals — pandas rolling in the snow, corgi butts and cats carrying out literally anything — have constantly been extensively shared and are just one of the most popular styles of viral information, she claimed.

It does not hurt that bears — like Winnie the Pooh, Baloo in “The Jungle Book” or even Paddington — are typically depicted as warm and smooth creatures in popular society.

The pictures and movies act “as a reprieve from the damaging news of the planet,” Maddox told CNN. “For the duration of the time of the COVID-19 pandemic, this feels especially real.”

Candice Rusch, spokesperson for Check out.org, also thinks the 7 days has arrive to represent “one thing positive, and even a very little silly, in a time when it can truly feel like each individual story is unfavorable.”

“Fats Bear Week offers us a prospect to have a very little enjoyable,” Rusch mentioned. “It allows us celebrate the point that the salmon operate was healthier ample to get the bears (to) their peak body fat point out. And who doesn’t like how lovely the bears are as they spherical out in the slide?”

The yearly situation, with its adorable, chubby bears, feels specifically suited for the world wide web, where by these “sweet” qualities tend to be celebrated.

“Excess fat Bear Week in unique has all of the ‘cute’ qualities we associate with animals on-line, and in this article, people attributes are quite actually the place – roundness, perceived fluffiness, smushiness, and many others,” Maddox mentioned, noting, while, that she would under no circumstances strategy them in the wild.

Even now, sweet animals are the epitome of social sharing on the net, Maddox stated, as viewing something “adorable” invokes both of those the want to interact with the object (think of looking at a sweet dog on the street) or share a image with a pal. The latter particularly is aspect of what would make Fats Bear 7 days so enjoyment.

And every person likes a opposition

But the week also presents individuals some thing to cheer for, with no the stakes of, say, a playoff athletics recreation.

“When you glimpse at how substantially bodyweight bears have to have to obtain to survive six months of famine, you can not enable but cheer them on. Persons appreciate bears and they like a fantastic competition,” said Amber Kraft, interpretation and instruction system manager at the Katmai National Park and Preserve. “For us, we are joyful to share because excess fat bears exemplify the richness of Katmai Countrywide Park and Bristol Bay, Alaska.”

The park, in the southwest corner of Alaska, is dwelling to close to 2,200 bears, according to a study accomplished in 2004. In 2020, there were more than 90 personal bears, not like cubs, alongside the Brooks River, the 1.5-mile waterway where by the salmon operate, Kraft explained. When getting ready for hibernation, a dominant adult male could capture and consume more than 30 fish a working day, and by the close of the slide, they can weigh over 1,000 lbs ..