Novarupta is a volcano that was formed in 1912, located on the Alaska Peninsula on a slope of Trident Volcano in Katmai National Park and Preserve, about 290 miles (470 km) southwest of Anchorage. Formed during the largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century, Novarupta released 30 times the volume of magma of the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens.
Katmai National Park and Preserve is a United States national park and preserve in southwest Alaska, notable for the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes and for its brown bears. The park and preserve encompass 4,093,077 acres, which is between the sizes of Connecticut and New Jersey. Most of the national park is a designated wilderness area. The park is named after Mount Katmai, its centerpiece stratovolcano. The park is located on the Alaska Peninsula, across from Kodiak Island, with headquarters in nearby King Salmon, about 290 miles (470 km) southwest of Anchorage. The area was first designated a national monument in 1918 to protect the area around the major 1912 volcanic eruption of Novarupta, which formed the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes, a 40-square-mile (100 km2), 100-to-700-foot-deep pyroclastic flow. The park includes as many as 18 individual volcanoes, seven of which have been active since 1900.
Naknek Lake is a lake in southern Alaska, near the base of the Alaska Peninsula. Located in Katmai National Park and Preserve, the lake is 40 miles (64 km) long and three to eight miles wide, the largest lake in the park. The lake drains west into Bristol Bay through the Naknek River. The elevation of the lake has lowered over the past 5,000 years as it has cut through a glacial moraine, separating Naknek Lake and Brooks Lake and creating Brooks Falls about 3500 years ago.
The Alagnak River is a 64-mile (103 km) tributary of the Kvichak River in the U.S. state of Alaska. It has a catchment area of approximately 1400 square mi (3600 km2). It is located in central Lake and Peninsula Borough.
Timothy Treadwell was an American bear enthusiast, environmentalist, documentary filmmaker, and founder of the bear-protection organization Grizzly People. He lived among coastal brown bears in Katmai National Park, Alaska, for 13 summers.
Grizzly Man is a 2005 American documentary film by German director Werner Herzog. It chronicles the life and death of bear enthusiast and conservationist Timothy Treadwell and his girlfriend Amie Huguenard at Katmai National Park, Alaska. The film includes some of Treadwell's own footage of his interactions with brown bears before 2003, and of interviews with people who knew or were involved with Treadwell, in addition to professionals who deal with wild bears.
The McNeil River is a river on the eastern drainage of the Alaska Peninsula near its base and conjunction with the Alaska mainland. The McNeil emerges from glaciers and alpine lakes in the mountains of the Aleutian Range. The river's destination is the Cook Inlet in Alaska's southwest. The McNeil is the prime habitat of numerous animals, but it is famous for its salmon and brown bears. This wealth of wildlife was one of the reasons for the Alaska State Legislature's decision to designate the McNeil River a wildlife sanctuary in 1967. In 1993, this protected area was enlarged to preserve an area that has the highest concentration of brown bears anywhere in the world. According to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, up to 144 brown bears have been sighted on the river in a single summer with 74 bears congregating in one place at a time Its entire length of 35 mi (56 km) lies within the McNeil River State Game Sanctuary, created in 1967 by the State of Alaska to protect the numerous Alaska brown bears who frequented the area. It also lies entirely within the Kenai Peninsula Borough boundaries. The McNeil River State Game Sanctuary and Refuge is part of a 3.8-million-acre (15,000 km2) piece of land that is protected from hunting; the rest of this is Katmai National Park.
Night of the Grizzlies (1969) is a book by Jack Olsen which details events surrounding the night of August 13, 1967, when two young women were separately attacked and killed in Glacier National Park, Montana, by grizzly bears. Both women, Julie Helgeson, 19, of Albert Lea, Minnesota, and Michele Koons, 19, of San Diego, California, died of their injuries.
The grizzly bear, also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
The Brooks Camp Boat House is a historic boathouse at Brooks Camp, a major visitor site in Katmai National Park and Preserve, located on the Alaska Peninsula of southwestern Alaska. The boat house is a simple rectangular log structure with large double-leaf door on the water side, and a door and window on the land side. It was built in 1959 by the National Park Service, and is the second building built in the park by the Park Service. It is used as a ranger station.
The Brooks River Historic Ranger Station is a log structure located at Brooks Camp in Katmai National Park and Preserve, located on the Alaska Peninsula of southwestern Alaska. It is a single-story building, made out of peeled logs felled in 1954 and assembled in 1955. The building was the first structure built by the National Park Service in Katmai National Park. It was built in part to oversee the growing Brooks Camp facility, which had been built over time by tourism concessionaires.
Bears is a 2014 American nature documentary film about a family of brown bears living in the coastal mountain ranges of Alaska. Directed by Alastair Fothergill and Keith Scholey and narrated by John C. Reilly, Bears was released theatrically by Disneynature on April 18, 2014, the seventh nature documentary released under that label. It generally received positive reviews from critics.
Brooks Camp is a visitor attraction and archeological site in Katmai National Park and Preserve, noted for its opportunities for visitors to observe Alaskan brown bears catching fish in the falls of the Brooks River during salmon spawning season. Famous for its Fat Bear Week, where hundred of thousand observers watch the week long event. The Brooks River connects Lake Brooks and Naknek Lake over about 2 kilometres. The natural bottleneck for salmon migrations rendered it a desirable site for ancient Alaskans, who inhabited the region around 4500 BP. In the past, the Aglegmuit people inhabited the Brooks River area. The Brooks River Archeological District, which includes Brooks Camp, was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1993.
Kukaklek is a lake in southern Alaska, near the base of the Alaska Peninsula. Located in Katmai National Park and Preserve, the lake is 46,080 acres (18,650 ha) in area and is the source for the Alagnak River, a designated Wild River. Notable for its excellent sport fishing, it is rated as one of the top wilderness destinations in Alaska. Wildlife in the area is typical of the Alaskan Peninsula, with grizzly bears, moose, gray wolf, and caribou frequently seen around the lake's shores. Grizzly bears in particular are frequently seen around the lake during the salmon run. The lake has recently been the source for a controversial grizzly bear hunt in Katmai Preserve.
The Alaska Peninsula brown bear or "peninsular grizzly" is a colloquial nomenclature for a possible brown bear subspecies that lives in the coastal regions of southern Alaska. It may be a population of the mainland grizzly bear subspecies.
Brooks Falls is a waterfall located within Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska. Located on the Brooks River a mile and a half (2.4 km) from Brooks Lake and an equal distance from Naknek Lake, the falls are famous for watching salmon leap over the 6 foot falls to get to their Brooks Lake spawning grounds. Consequently, large populations of brown bears are attracted to feed on the spawning salmon. Brown bears usually congregate at the falls in July through early September, and many well-known photos of bears have been taken there, particularly Thomas Mangelsen's Catch of the Day. July witnesses the greatest concentrations of bears of any month at the falls; up to 25 bears have been seen at one time at Brooks Falls in that month. In September, a smaller number of bears can be seen at the falls to feast on the later salmon runs.
Fat Bear Week is an annual event held in October by Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska, commemorating the seasonal preparations made by Alaska peninsula brown bears inhabiting Katmai as they ready themselves for their winter hibernation. The competition is organized by the National Park Service and Explore.org. Spectators from around the world are invited to cast online votes to determine the bear that has most effectively accumulated fat reserves. In 2023, Associated Press called the competition "Alaska's most-watched popularity contest".
