Docile giants still in peril

Bill Walsh is a volunteer who helps manatees recover from illness or injury from boat encounters. ASSOCIATED PRESS Enlarge

ORANGE CITY, Fla. -- Bill Walsh adjusts his headphones as if he is trying to find a distant FM station whose signal is too weak to pick up.

Actually, he's looking for Jackie. She's young, coy, curvaceous, and well over 800 pounds.

"She's beautiful," Walsh says about the Florida manatee he seeks an electronic rendezvous with on a crisp winter morning here in Blue Spring State Park, about halfway between Orlando and Daytona Beach.

Jackie, who was rescued near Jacksonville in 2008 after she was observed entangled in a fishing net and found to be in extremely poor health, was fitted with a transmitter when she was released a year ago. Walsh, part of a network of volunteers with the conservation group Sea2Shore, expects Jackie to come back to Blue Spring, her historical wintering site.

"As long as she looks like she's been eating well and gaining weight, I'll be satisfied. I just need her to show up here, to be sure."

The park and its prolific font of constant 72-degree water work like a cold-weather magnet for the manatees, an endangered marine mammal that inhabits the coastal waters of the southern United States, then seek out springs and warm-water discharges around power plants in the winter.

Although it appears blubbery and well-insulated, the manatee is not, and if the water temperature drops below 68 degrees, its systems can quickly be compromised.

The animals that are leisurely prowling Blue Spring, the largest spring on the St. Johns River, are Florida manatees, a subspecies of the West Indian manatee and a relative of the Steller's sea cow, which was hunted to extinction more than 200 years ago.

An internal GPS is believed to be drawing the manatees to Blue Spring, other natural springs around the state, and the power plants each winter.

"What makes them tick is sort of anyone's guess," said Katie Tripp, the director of science and conservation for the Save the Manatee organization. "But they seem to know where they are going and what they are doing."

Florida manatees are one of the most endangered marine mammals around, and only about 5,000 are believed to exist. They are huge animals -- the average adult is 10 feet long and weighs half a ton. They resemble a walrus in some ways, a whale in others, but are most closely related to elephants.

Manatees have paddle-like front limbs, no hind limbs, and a large, flat tail. Manatees are thought to have evolved from a wading animal that ate exclusively plants. They remain docile vegetarians, dining primarily on floating sea grasses.

Food, as well as water temperature, become the critical issues for the manatees in the winter months. The nearly 120 manatees found in Blue Spring during a daily census in mid-January represented only a little more than half the number expected to winter there.

"Some of them come and go, but we have had as many as 300 at a time in the spring run," said Lynn Flannery, a park services specialist at Blue Spring. "They're safe here, and it's nice to see that."

Special rules in place from November through March close the section of the river where the spring boils up and feeds the St. Johns, keeping swimmers and divers out.

The spring area, which was home to Native Americans for centuries, is closed to boats throughout the year, and sections of the St. Johns River and many other Florida waterways have speed restrictions in place to protect the manatees from propeller strikes.

With no natural enemies in the inland waters, the major threats to the long-term existence of the slow-moving manatees are presented by boats and development.

"It's a constant struggle," said Tripp, a native Pennsylvanian who first saw manatees on a PBS special as a young child, and was working during the summer as a volunteer at a Florida wildlife park at age 12.

She said her organization, which was established more than 30 years ago by Florida singer/songwriter Jimmy Buffett, and many others like him are working to ensure that development does not destroy manatee feeding or wintering areas, and that speed zones are enforced and their effectiveness continually monitored.

"You can't protect an animal without protecting its habitat," she said. "We have to cast a very wide net in our efforts to protect the manatees."

Flannery said most of the manatees that use Blue Spring have been named by the volunteers who help with the tracking and population surveys of the manatees. The animals are identified by their unique battle scars, left by boat strikes.

"The volunteers play a very important role in the whole effort to keep the manatees around," Flannery said. "They are extremely passionate about this cause. If we suspect an animal is sick or injured, they jump right in to help."

Assistance in the protection and preservation of the Florida manatee has also come from distant partners. The Columbus Zoo is about 925 miles and a few climate zones away from the palm trees and live oaks draped in Spanish moss inside Blue Spring State Park, but both locations are on the front line in the effort to save the wrinkly-skinned mammals with the whiskered noses.

The Ohio zoo opened a manatee exhibit in 1999 at the urging of its sometimes flamboyant director emeritus, Jack Hanna. The venue is one of less than a dozen in the nation equipped to take in injured or orphaned manatees and rehabilitate them for release back to the wild.

The zoo has four manatees now, and 13 have been rehabbed in Columbus and then transported back to Florida for release. About 45-60 manatees are in the rehabilitation program network at any one time, with 10-15 a year ready for release.

"It's been very rewarding to be part of a successful program like this," said Doug Warmolts, the zoo's director of animal care.

"The population of manatees in Florida seems to be at least stable right now, but we're also aware this issue is not without some politics. These animals live in and around some of the most expensive real estate and some of the most sought after waterways in the country, so there are other forces at work."

The individuals and organizations engaged in the effort to protect the manatees and minimize their encounters with boats and jet skis hope that exhibits like that at the Columbus Zoo, and locations such as Blue Spring will provide people with the opportunity to observe the manatees and have a stake in their survival.

"We've made progress," Tripp said. "Thirty years ago, people didn't know what a manatee was, and now people come to Florida strictly to see the manatees. Awareness of the issue has definitely increased a great deal."

Warmolts said the Columbus Zoo is proud to be part of the pipeline that cares for injured manatees with the intention of getting them back in their native habitat as soon as possible. He hopes the zoo's display gives visitors a graphic look at the losers in the manatee vs. boat encounters.

"When they are on display here, people can see the injuries and we get a chance to explain how those occur," he said. "Nobody is suggesting the only way to protect the manatees is to ban boat traffic, but like any conservation program, there's a balance that needs to be sought. We hope we're working in that direction."

Meanwhile, the volunteer Walsh stands on the corner of one of the metal observation decks that jut out over the Blue Spring run, twisting his hand-held antenna and listening for Jackie's transmitter. He remains confident that Jackie, who was treated and rehabilitated at Sea World in Orlando before her release, won't stand him up.

"These are amazing animals," he said. "She'll find her way back, and I want to be waiting here when she does."

Contact Blade outdoors editor Matt Markey at: mmarkey@theblade.com oR 419-724-6068