Fat Bear Week: Alaska to choose most portly and hibernation-prepared bear

Voting is underway at Katmai National Park and Preserve of bears who have feasted on salmon running through the Brooks River

America may feel like a divided society but one thing is guaranteed to unite the nation each year: Fat Bear Week, a seven-year-old competition held in October to choose the fattest, most gorged and hibernation-prepared bear in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska.

Fat Bear Week, which closes Tuesday and gathered 650,000 voting participants last year, is the creation of Explore.org, an online showcase for wildlife webcam videos, nature films and photographs that, it says, creates a portal into the soul of humanity".