Female brown bear kills, eats cub in Katmai National Park

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) - A female brown bear was caught on camera killing and then later eating a spring cub in Katmai National Park and Preserve on Tuesday, compelling park rangers to address the incident with the public.

Content Warning: Some of the images described and shown could be disturbing to some viewers.

The incident, which park rangers described as an “infanticide,” was caught Explore.org’s Kat’s River View live feed early Tuesday morning.

In the video, the adult female, identified by rangers as 806, can be seen sitting on a spit downstream from Brooks River. Her two cubs are lingering nearby — one of them identified as “Biggie,” a two-and-a-half-year-old bear who had been adopted by 806.

Nearby, a third cub, identified as belonging to 909, is alone. Rangers presumed in a live commentary on the incident that 909 had left her cub alone to go fishing.

“Often the mother bears don’t seem to show a whole lot of curiosity towards cubs of other families,” Mike Fitz, a naturalist with Explore.org, explained.

“But in this situation, eventually 806 certainly became interested.”

After 909’s cub hop-charged Biggie, 806 can be seen approaching the cub, who began to run away.

This, rangers theorize, could be the moment that ultimately led up to the attack.

“The only thing that runs in the forest in nature is food, food for a predator,” Sarah Bruce, a park ranger at Katmai, said.

“I think that there is some of those basic instincts at play here where it’s like, ‘This thing is running from me, therefore it is probably something that I can eat,’ and I do think that is probably what kind of kicked in for 806 here.”

Bear 806 can be seen attacking 909’s cub, which attempts to run away, before again being attacked by 806.

During the final attack, a second adult female, which Fitz speculated to be 909, is seen approaching 806, before ultimately turning and crossing the river in search of her cub.

Later on in the live feed, 806 is seen eating the remains of 909’s cub.

“Bears are omnivorous,” Christine Loberg, another park ranger at Katmai, said.

“They’ll eat just about anything, and just when you hear that word, it kind of sends shivers up my spine sometimes because that means anything."

806 is later seen burying the dead cub, which rangers theorized could be her caching the remains to eat later.

However, another bear — thought to be 909 by Fitz but not for certain — is seen digging up the cub and dragging it away later in the day.

According to Fitz, this is not the first case of a female killing a cub at Katmai National Park, but it is the first instance of an infanticide occurring near Brooks River.

Following the incident, rangers and bear enthusiasts alike are working to understand what could have prompted the attack. Alongside the predation theory, rangers noted the large number of cubs in Katmai this year.

“It has been an exceptional year for mother bears and cubs at the river,” Fitz said. “We’ve never seen this many cubs in families before.”

“Think about all those cubs and families intermixing on the river and up and down the corridor,” Loberg said. “That’s a lot to be dealing with.”

Fitz said that he does not believe 806 felt her cubs were threatened during the incident.

“A spring cub is not a physical threat to her cubs,” he said.

While rangers continue to work to figure out why the infanticide occurred, Katmai Conservancy said the incident is an unfortunate aspect of nature.

“We know this was heartbreaking and upsetting to watch, especially for those who have spent the summer following the bears and watching the cubs grow,” they said in a post on their Facebook page.

“The bears of Katmai live without human intervention, and the bear cams provide an unfiltered look at their lives, including the difficult moments alongside the joyful ones.”

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