Wildlife
Brooks Falls Bears and Salmon: 5 Live Cameras — Katmai
Four cameras in Katmai National Park, Alaska, and one on the river just outside. Sockeye leaping the falls, and brown bears competing for the best spots.
What you can see
Five cameras stand along the Brooks River in Alaska. They are ordered here from the falls downstream toward the mouth, so opening them in order shows you where the salmon are and where the bears have gone.
Brooks Falls brown bears is the famous view. Sockeye leap the falls and the bears wait on top to catch them. A large, skilled bear will eat more than 30 fish — over 120 pounds of salmon — in a day. Bald eagles, gulls and occasionally wolves come to the same river.
The riffles below the falls is a shallow stretch about 100 yards downstream. Mothers with playful cubs and young bears sizing up the distance pass through often, and you see them play, fish and eat at close range. By September the riffles fill with spawning salmon.
Lower Brooks River looks over the reach where the river runs into Naknek Lake. In early summer mothers and cubs avoiding the crowd at the falls prefer it. From September into October the salmon spawn and die, and it becomes an important fishing spot for bears feeding up before the winter den.
River watch sits near the river mouth and alternates between two views, downstream-north and downstream-east, following both the salmon coming up and the bears after them. The audio on the lower-river cameras is a recorded loop; live sound is off for privacy.
The Naknek River is just outside the park, running through the town of King Salmon. It is 35 miles long, empties into Bristol Bay and is part of one of the most productive salmon watersheds on earth. After the ice breaks in spring there are beluga whales chasing smaller fish, and swans, geese and ducks on migration. The sunrises and sunsets are good all year.
Cameras you can watch now: 5
All 5 are live video. Tap one to open it in the camera list.
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Live video, late June-July
Brown bears at Brooks Falls (Katmai)
Alaska, Katmai National Park · Wildlife · River
Sockeye salmon leap the falls while brown bears compete for the best fishing spots. The largest and most successful bears catch and eat more than thirty salmon, over 120 pounds, in a day. The operator gives late June and July, during the sockeye migration, as the time bears are most abundant. Bald eagles, gulls and the occasional wolf come for the same feast.
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Live video, September
The Riffles, below Brooks Falls
Alaska, Katmai National Park · Wildlife · River
A hundred yards downstream of Brooks Falls, this stretch is used by mothers with playful cubs and by wary sub-adults. They fish, eat and play close to the camera. In September the riffles are packed with spawning salmon.
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Live video, Sept-Oct
Lower Brooks River, at Naknek Lake
Alaska, Katmai National Park · Wildlife · River
Looking over the spot where the Brooks River meets Naknek Lake. In early summer it is a favourite of mothers with cubs avoiding the crowd at the falls. In September and October, as the salmon spawn and die, the lower river becomes an important place for bears to fish before hibernation.
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Live video
Brooks River watch (two angles)
Alaska, Katmai National Park · Wildlife · River
Near the outlet of the Brooks River, this camera switches between two angles, Lower River North and Lower River East, following both the migrating salmon and the bears fishing for them. The audio on the lower river cameras is a pre-recorded loop; live audio is off for privacy.
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Live video
Naknek River at King Salmon
Alaska, King Salmon · River · Wildlife
The Naknek River runs through the town of King Salmon just outside Katmai National Park. Thirty-five miles long, it empties into Bristol Bay and drains one of the most productive salmon watersheds on Earth. In spring, once the ice breaks, watch for beluga whales chasing small fish and for migrating swans, geese and ducks. Sunrises and sunsets are worth it all year.
When to watch
The season differs by camera, because the bears follow the salmon and the salmon move along the river.
The falls: late June and July, when the sockeye are leaping. The riffles: September, when spawning salmon fill the shallows. The lower river: September and October, as the spawned-out salmon die. The provider gives no season for river watch or the Naknek River.
The offset is 17 hours in summer. Local 08:00 is 01:00 the next day in Japan, local noon is 05:00 and local 18:00 is 11:00. So the Japanese small hours and morning are the Alaskan day. Open them in the Japanese evening and it is still the previous night there.
Late June and July in Alaska have very long days — it can still be light at 22:00 local — which keeps the picture usable into the Japanese afternoon. From September the days shorten and the window narrows with them.
If it isn't showing
There are four more Alaskan bear-and-salmon cameras on Anan Creek Black Bears. Those are black bears rather than brown, and the peak there is July and August, slightly offset from this one. Side by side, you can see how species and river shape change the way they fish.
All five also appear on the United States page. What to look for in American park cameras is in US national park cameras; river cameras are gathered under River and animals under Wildlife.
For Japanese rivers where the wait is for fish running upstream, Subjects That Keep You Waiting is the closest page. Choosing an hour to open them is covered in Which cameras are in daylight now.
Where to find Brooks Falls Bears and Salmon
Agencies publishing the cameras on this page
- explore.org (Deep links and embeds OK, no image reuse) — Official site
The footage belongs to each agency. This site is an unofficial guide, and each sample frame was copied once per camera under that agency's terms of use.