News

Blue Spring State Park Adoption Update

By Wayne Hartley, Manatee Specialist

The manatee season at Blue Spring started late, on the 22nd of November, with 44 manatees present in the spring run and over 300 individuals seen by the end of November. As of this writing, nearly 800 manatees have been seen this season and stragglers continue to come in. Over 500 manatees have returned from last season, 22 have come back from previous seasons, and we have seen close to 80 new calves. Keeping track of calves with hundreds of other manatees at the spring is like herding cats! Manatee moms, like human moms, seem to regard the park as a safe place where there is little need to keep careful track of their young. But they still manage to find each other again before leaving the park.

We continue counting hundreds of manatees every day as the weather stays cool, keeping the St. Johns River at an uncomfortably low temperature for the manatees. Manatees keep packing the run for the warmer spring water. Our highest count for roll call at the time of this writing is 733 manatees.

One manatee with cold stress was rescued and we are keeping an eye on several others raised in human care. The majority of manatees raised in human care that are released at Blue Spring adapt quickly to the wild but some take a bit longer to realize there will be no romaine lettuce appearing in the run. Do not come to feed them. They have to learn to survive in the wild. That includes leaving the run for brief periods to feed themselves.

Our adoptees arrived in the following order. Moo Shoo was the first adoptee in on November 23. On the 24th came Howie and siblings Philip and Phyllis with her calf. Ester and her calf and Rocket were in the next day. Ester was not an adoptee then, but she is now! Aqua and her calf came in on November 26. Lily arrived on November 30. December 1 was a big day—we saw Gator, Una, and Whiskers. The next day, Margarito, Nick, and Paddy Doyle were in. Our biggest day was December 3, when Brutus, Deep Dent, Doc, and Floyd showed up. Flash graced us with his presence on December 4 and Merlin on the 5th. Annie had been spending her time in a spring to our north but popped in at Blue Spring on February 17 to let us know she is well. Lenny has not shown up anywhere yet and neither has Lucille. Lenny has not wintered anywhere else than Blue Spring since he was born so it is worrisome.