News

Manatee Sightings Update: February 2023

Wayne Hartley, Manatee Specialist, and Cora Berchem, Director of Multimedia and Manatee Research Associate, take "roll call" on a cold winter morning at Blue Spring State Park. Photo courtesy David Schrichte.
Wayne Hartley, Manatee Specialist, and Cora Berchem, Director of Multimedia and Manatee Research Associate, take "roll call" on a cold winter morning at Blue Spring State Park. Photo courtesy David Schrichte.

By Cora Berchem, Director of Multimedia and Manatee Research Associate

Manatee season was off to a slow start with warmer than average temperatures in November and early December, but the freeze over Christmas and another freeze the second weekend of January surely brought the manatees into Blue Spring. The park staff counted a record 729 manatees on January 17th, which is eight manatees higher than the previous record! All Save the Manatee Club adoptees, except for Lucille, have been seen this season, and we’ve gotten some great photos and video!

All activities conducted under permits DEP #02042213 and USFWS #MA791721-6.

Sightings Update: Blue Spring Adoptees

Adoptee Annie still looks very pregnant! We are keeping a close eye on her and hopefully there will be a healthy calf sooner than later!
On December 29, adoptee Aqua was seen with her calf traveling through a large aggregation of manatees. Our research team counted over 400 manatees in the spring that morning.
It’s not often that two of our adoptees show up on camera together, but on December 29, Flash and Phyllis could be seen traveling through an aggregation together!
Floyd arrived for the winter season on Christmas Day, December 25 together with Doc. Here he is traveling through the Blue Spring sanctuary on December 29 as seen on our above-water webcam.
Adoptee Millie has been making more than usual visits to Blue Spring. It seems like she has picked this protected sanctuary as her winter home this year after alternating between Blue Spring, the Silver River, and Port Everglades in years past. Here she is traveling through Blue Spring on New Year’s Day.
Early in the morning on January 22nd, adoptees Paddy Doyle and Lenny were resting almost side by side in the warm water at Blue Spring.

Other Blue Spring Sightings

Sometimes the manatees on our webcam crack us up, like this juvenile checking something out under the stairs! We asked our social media followers to caption some stills from the video and got some fun results! “If I move up a little bit, can I hide underneath it?” “It can stay, looks like a worthwhile item” “Where’s the elevator?” “Good! No one found my cookie stash!!”

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Merlin rests at Blue Spring State Park on February 22, 2025.

Sightings Update: April 2025

Late February and early March saw more cold weather and we counted over 400 manatees on February 22 and over 300 on March 8, which might be a record for March.