Bears in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska have been bulking up on salmon before winter. On Tuesday, annual voting kicks off for the favorite.

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I have good news. It is officially Fat Bear Week. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, Fat Bear Week is the annual online competition where people around the world vote for their favorite chubby brown bear at Alaska's Katmai National Park and Preserve. Last year, more than a million people participated, myself included. Alaska Public Media's Ava White reports.

AVA WHITE, BYLINE: Think of March Madness but with thousand-pound bears instead of basketball teams. Katmai park ranger Sarah Bruce says the bigger the bear, the better.

SARAH BRUCE: There is no such thing as too fat of a bear. The fatter a bear is, the healthier that bear is.

WHITE: Bears need a lot of body fat to survive winter hibernation. This year's contest will feature 16 chubby contenders. The field includes Chunk, last year's weighty winner, along with a few offspring of former champions. And for the first time, Bruce said, whole bear families are included. So, if you vote for bear 901, you're voting for a mother and her cub.

BRUCE: And we can kind of show off how the mothers have to feed not only themselves, but all of these other cubs with them too.

WHITE: Katmai National Park and Preserve is almost only accessible by boat or plane. It's on the Alaska Peninsula, which the park service estimates has more bears than people. Bruce, the park ranger, says the abundant salmon runs there allowed bears to almost double their body weight.

Fat Bear Week started in 2014 as a one-day celebration. The bears have since become internet celebrities, drawing fans from all over the world, like Landin Norman, a priest who lives in Arkansas and runs a popular Fat Bear Week Facebook group. He has a handful of favorite bears in the competition, including number 164, or Bucky.

LANDIN NORMAN: And he's, like, crazy, crazy big. So I have a feeling that he's probably going to become one of the more dominant bears that are out there.

WHITE: He thinks people love Fat Bear Week because it offers a welcome break from the everyday stressors of life.

NORMAN: I think I probably enjoy it more because my job is really hard. It's like a reprieve. It's just, like, oh, cool, I'm going to look at bears. It's just lighthearted.

WHITE: Online voting runs through September 29 when a chunky champion will be crowned.

For NPR News, I'm Ava White in Anchorage.

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