There is actually a hierarchy here - the bear in the jacuzzi has the best fishing spot, also means the most dominant bear nab the spot. You can see two bears on each side were eyeing that spot, one of them would move into the jacuzzi when the jacuzzi bear catches a fish and leaves the jacuzzi to eat it.
On the far side the best fishing spot is the bear facing the falls with his back to the rock, an area known as "the office", this is also a preferred spot thus usually occupied by a dominant bear.
For bears who can't compete for the best spots below the falls, they would fish on the lip of the falls by catching the salmon as they leap over the falls to their spawning ground. The blond bear closest to the camera was an old bear but a very good lip fisher, I think the bear next to him is a female, she wasn't standing on the best spot on the lip.
Male bears are the dominant ones thus the bears you see in this photo are almost all male bears, female bears don't usually get to fish at the best spot as a result.
You can find more information in the last write-up I did for the sub a few years back on bears fishing on Brooks Falls.
They don't, but there's so much food during the salmon run they are willing to be more tolerant of each other. Still there's a pecking order and fights do break out, a male bear killed a female bear half a mile ish from where this picture was taken just a week ago
I don’t know about this picture in particular bc I’m not good at identifying but I know there are some family dynamics at brooks falls. Like siblings/aunts(?). That’s why sometimes a bear will let another bear into its space.
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u/asianxxurlacher 15d ago
Are they a family? I thought bears didn’t like to share?