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BOSTON, MA – AUGUST 16, 2024. While the world watched the 2024 Olympics in Paris, FOUR PAWS Bear Sanctuary Müritz in Germany was busy celebrating their international ursid sleep-athletes. The rescue animals, who participated in the spring snoozing contest known as March Napness, received a sweet surprise from awarding-winning author and plant-based Chef Priyanka Naik who visited the rescue bear sanctuary all the way from New York City. The star chef is a TV host, Washington Post journalist, and Food Network Champion.

To honor the bears, Chef Priyanka created an original “BEAR-y Tartare” recipe inspired by and comprised of nutritious ingredients brown bears love, including melon, berries, beets, oranges, and walnuts. While the dish was specifically developed for bears, it’s a healthy treat for humans who also love fruits and veggies or prefer a plant-based diet. The official March Napness 2024 winner, Bear Dushi, unfortunately passed away several weeks before she could enjoy the delicious celebration. However, her adorable “Dream Team” of hibernating sanctuary mates were more than eager to accept their foodie award.   

Located within two hours driving distance of Hamburg or Berlin, Bear Sanctuary Müritz gives visitors the chance to observe animals from a safe distance in a landscape reminiscent of their natural forest environment, without directly touching, riding, hugging or exploiting them as selfie props. Additionally, the sanctuary offers delicious, locally sourced plant-based meals, eco-friendly souvenirs, and an educational opportunity for all ages.

Chef Priyanka travelled to Germany in July 2024 to visit the bears and to help FOUR PAWS raise awareness of the plight of bears in captivity. The representing Dream Team of rescue bears -- Michal, Dasha, Lelya and Silvia -- welcomed Chef Priyanka to Bear Sanctuary Müritz, currently home to 11 brown bears in total. After personally meeting and congratulating each bear, Chef Priyanka took over the sanctuary’s Bear Kitchen to prepare the gourmet dish and joined the international animal caretakers to deliver the delicacy -- “U-Bear Eats” style! -- directly to each winner’s spacious enclosure. The bears happily devoured the colorful and celebratory dish, which was served on tree branch rounds fashioned as plates, then placed on tables made from fallen logs within the bear forest. (Caveat: One waist-watching bear, Sylvia, let brother Pavle have her portion.)

“I believe showing compassion through food is the easiest way to show our love,” says Chef Priyanka. “I wanted to create something colorful, nutritious, special and ultimately fun-to-eat. It was the most heartwarming and fulfilling experience to watch these beautiful animals eat my dish. I'd like to believe they were savoring it. Overall, it was an incredibly gratifying and sentimental moment. These bears are getting a second chance at life and are able to live in safety and comfort now.”

According to FOUR PAWS Sustainable Sanctuaries Tourism Development Coordinator Svenja Voss, many of the bears never had the chance to hibernate or even dig their own den before arriving at Bear Sanctuary Müritz. “Being able to provide them with the prerequisites to show this behavior and seeing them follow their natural instincts, despite never having ‘learnt’ how, is what I celebrate with March Napness,” says Voss. “That's the greatest gift these rescue bears can give us. It shows that what we're doing is working.”

Seeing animals while on vacation is a highlight for many people. However, thousands of animals suffer just to entertain tourists, posing a genuine health and safety risk to travelers. By making a conscious decision to visit sanctuaries instead of roadside zoos and other cruel and exploitative venues, we can all do our part to protect animals. The FOUR PAWS Travel Kind program is a movement to ensure travelers can enjoy all the world has to offer without contributing to animal suffering.  

FOUR PAWS is the global animal welfare organization for animals under direct human influence, which reveals suffering, rescues animals in need, and protects them. FOUR PAWS’ sustainable campaigns and projects focus on companion animals including stray dogs and cats, farm animals and wild animals – such as bears, big cats, and orangutans – kept in inappropriate conditions as well as in disaster and conflict zones. With offices in 15 countries including one in Boston, Massachusetts, as well as sanctuaries for rescued animals in eleven countries, FOUR PAWS provides rapid help and long-term solutions.

Inspired by the popularity of March Madness, March Napness is a global tournament-style bracket competition that shines a light on rescued bears (even if they are too sleepy to notice). The sleep contest highlights FOUR PAWS’ efforts to rescue and protect the world’s “saddest bears.” A large demand for bears in captivity exists globally for their use in bear baiting and hunting, dancing bear performances and other tourist attractions, petting or hands-on exhibits among many other cruelties. FOUR PAWS rescues bears from deplorable conditions to ultimately house them in sanctuaries where they are provided with a species-appropriate and most natural environment possible.  FOUR PAWS raises funds to not only help care for bears in their 6 bear sanctuaries, but to rescue and advocate for others around the world.

More about FOUR PAWS bear sanctuaries:

FOUR PAWS houses over 100 rescued bears throughout its seven, species-appropriate bear sanctuaries across the globe. Our work focuses on the welfare of captive brown bears in Europe and Asiatic black bears in Vietnam, as well as rescues from crisis, conflict, and disaster zones. The bears living in FOUR PAWS sanctuaries come from different backgrounds, and their care is specifically tailored to each bear, not only to make sure they can recover physically and mentally from their past suffering but also to make their individual personalities flourish. Most of the bears rescued by FOUR PAWS have been the victims of horrible maltreatment – they were exploited as circus, dancing, or selfie bears, abused for their bile, sold in the illegal wildlife trade, and kept in chains and tiny cages. In addition to rescues, FOUR PAWS aims to find sustainable solutions and improve legal regulations for bears locally and has so far succeeded in putting an end to the keeping of dancing bears in Bulgaria and Serbia, the illegal keeping of restaurant bears in Kosovo and Albania, and the illegal private keeping of bears in Poland. FOUR PAWS has helped bears in Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Iraq, Jordan, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Poland, Serbia, Syria, Ukraine, and Vietnam.

According to FOUR PAWS Sustainable Sanctuaries Tourism Development Coordinator Svenja Voss, many of the bears never had the chance to hibernate or even dig their own den before arriving at Bear Sanctuary Müritz. “Being able to provide them with the prerequisites to show this behavior and seeing them follow their natural instincts, despite never having ‘learnt’ how, is what I celebrate with March Napness,” says Voss. “That's the greatest gift these rescue bears can give us. It shows that what we're doing is working.”

Seeing animals while on vacation is a highlight for many people. However, thousands of animals suffer just to entertain tourists, posing a genuine health and safety risk to travelers. By making a conscious decision to visit sanctuaries instead of roadside zoos and other cruel and exploitative venues, we can all do our part to protect animals. The FOUR PAWS Travel Kind program is a movement to ensure travelers can enjoy all the world has to offer without contributing to animal suffering.  

FOUR PAWS is the global animal welfare organization for animals under direct human influence, which reveals suffering, rescues animals in need, and protects them. FOUR PAWS’ sustainable campaigns and projects focus on companion animals including stray dogs and cats, farm animals and wild animals – such as bears, big cats, and orangutans – kept in inappropriate conditions as well as in disaster and conflict zones. With offices in 15 countries including one in Boston, Massachusetts, as well as sanctuaries for rescued animals in eleven countries, FOUR PAWS provides rapid help and long-term solutions.

Inspired by the popularity of March Madness, March Napness is a global tournament-style bracket competition that shines a light on rescued bears (even if they are too sleepy to notice). The sleep contest highlights FOUR PAWS’ efforts to rescue and protect the world’s “saddest bears.” A large demand for bears in captivity exists globally for their use in bear baiting and hunting, dancing bear performances and other tourist attractions, petting or hands-on exhibits among many other cruelties. FOUR PAWS rescues bears from deplorable conditions to ultimately house them in sanctuaries where they are provided with a species-appropriate and most natural environment possible.  FOUR PAWS raises funds to not only help care for bears in their 6 bear sanctuaries, but to rescue and advocate for others around the world.

More about FOUR PAWS bear sanctuaries:

FOUR PAWS houses over 100 rescued bears throughout its seven, species-appropriate bear sanctuaries across the globe. Our work focuses on the welfare of captive brown bears in Europe and Asiatic black bears in Vietnam, as well as rescues from crisis, conflict, and disaster zones. The bears living in FOUR PAWS sanctuaries come from different backgrounds, and their care is specifically tailored to each bear, not only to make sure they can recover physically and mentally from their past suffering but also to make their individual personalities flourish. Most of the bears rescued by FOUR PAWS have been the victims of horrible maltreatment – they were exploited as circus, dancing, or selfie bears, abused for their bile, sold in the illegal wildlife trade, and kept in chains and tiny cages. In addition to rescues, FOUR PAWS aims to find sustainable solutions and improve legal regulations for bears locally and has so far succeeded in putting an end to the keeping of dancing bears in Bulgaria and Serbia, the illegal keeping of restaurant bears in Kosovo and Albania, and the illegal private keeping of bears in Poland. FOUR PAWS has helped bears in Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Iraq, Jordan, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Poland, Serbia, Syria, Ukraine, and Vietnam.