TAMPA, Fla. — ZooTampa has surpassed its record for most manatees taken into the park's critical care center at 27 patients.
With November being Manatee Awareness Month, officials are using this announcement to highlight the ongoing need to help sick, injured and orphaned sea cows.
“We have already released 12 manatees back to Florida waters and have an additional 13 releases scheduled this winter," Tiffany Burns, ZooTampa’s senior director of animal programs and president of the Manatee Rescue and Rehabilitation Partnership, said in a statement. "However, the manatees keep coming in and the need for critical care intervention will be even higher as the temperatures drop and some manatees struggle to find warmer waters.”
In early November, ZooTampa took in a manatee rescued in the Big Bend of Florida that traveled nearly a mile and a half away from open water due to significant storm surge flooding.
On Monday, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission announced that a manatee found belly-up over the weekend in a canal in Pinellas County died from "chronic cold stress".
This week, park officials completed rehabilitation for two manatee patients and have sent them back to the wild.
One patient was Habanero, a 685-pound male manatee rescued in July 2023 by the FWC due to a watercraft impact. The other is Dawlee, a 1,000-pound female manatee rescued in May 2024 by the agency due to injuries sustained from a crab pot entanglement.
FWC says it is recommended you give manatees space if you spot any, as bothering them could force them to swim out to potentially life-threatening cold water. It is illegal to harass, feed, disturb or harm manatees.
If you see an injured, distressed, sick or dead manatee, you are asked to report it to FWC’s Wildlife Alert Hotline at 888-404-FWCC (3922). You should not try to physically handle a manatee as you could harm the animal or yourself.
