First Fat Bear Week winner remembered in short film

Once upon a time, there lived a fat bear. Bear #480, lovingly dubbed Otis, captured millions of hearts, as the first winner of Fat Bear Week over 10 years ago. For weeks, people tuned in to watch a popular livestream of him and the other bears at Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska. 

Today, explore.org released a video tribute in honor of this brown bear (Ursus arctos) ambassador. Love Letters to Otis begins in 2013 with one of his first appearances on the livestream, and chronicles how Otis provided entertainment for those at home during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. 

The short documentary even features some of the Otis-inspired artwork fans sent to the Katmai rangers, and shows off this zen bear’s distinct fishing style, along with some of the physical challenges he faced in his later years. Otis died in 2024. While we don’t know the exact cause of death, since these bears do not wear tracking collars, rangers suspect old age or natural causes. 

Love Letters to Otis

“His steadfast patience and determination when fishing at Brooks Falls gave many people a sense of calm,” Mike Fitz, a former National Park Service (NPS) ranger and explore.org naturalist told Popular Science in September. “He was an ambassador for his species who helped people fall in love with Brooks River and its bears and, in turn, [worked] to protect the salmon runs that sustain the Bristol Bay ecosystem.”

Explore.org Director of New Media Candice Rusch added that she has a particularly strong memory of Otis fishing in Brooks Falls in October 2021. 

“All the bears had mostly left the river and there was a massive snow storm,” she reflected. “Otis, calm as anything, sat in the river, in the snow, catching fish.”

In 2014, Otis was crowned the first winner of Fat Bear Tuesday, which would go on to become the popular Fat Bear Week. He wore the Fat Bear Week crown three more times (2016, 2017, and 2021). 

He was often seen at favorite spot in Brooks Falls, known as “Otis’s Office,” a pool on the river on the left side of the falls. 

The brown bears return to Brooks Falls for the salmon migration every year in late June. There, they fatten up for the long winter ahead. By late summer, the nutritious fish spawn and begin to die. The bears then move to the lower Brooks River in September and October to eat the dead and dying salmon near the river’s mouth.

Even two years after Otis’ death, he remains a beloved symbol of the park and its chunky bears. Brown bears like him can live up to 34 years in the wild, but males generally live 22 years. 

His legacy lives on through the Otis Fund, an annual fall fundraiser that raises money to support Katmai’s research, conservation, and educational outreach programs. Since 2020, the Otis Fund has raised over $4 million.