ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — A two-year experimental feeding program for starving Florida manatees will not immediately resume this winter because conditions have improved for the endangered marine mammals and the seagrass they depend on, wildlife officials said.
Thousands of pounds of lettuce were fed to manatees that typically congregate at the hot water discharge of a power plant on Florida's east coast during the winter months. State and federal wildlife officials launched the program after pollution killed vast eelgrass beds, leading to a record of more than 1,100 manatee deaths in 2021.
This season, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that seagrass is beginning to recover in key winter foraging areas on the East Coast, and that there appear to be fewer manatees in poor physical condition that are affecting the entering stressful colder conditions. months.
“After careful consideration, the agencies are not providing an additional food source for manatees at the start of the winter season,” the FWC said in a message on its website Friday. “However, staff have developed a contingency plan that they will implement if necessary.”
Last year, more than 400,000 pounds of lettuce, most of it donated, was fed to manatees near the power plant in Cocoa, Florida.
Manatees are gentle giants with round tails, also called manatees, that weigh up to 550 pounds and can live up to 65 years. Manatees are Florida's official marine mammal, but are listed as endangered. They are also at risk from boat strikes and outbreaks of toxic red algae along the state's Gulf Coast. Their closest living relative is the elephant.
The hunger problem — something conservation groups call an “unusual mortality event” — can be traced to nitrogen, phosphorus and sewage pollution from agriculture, urban runoff and other sources that cause algal blooms, which in turn kill the seagrass that sustains manatees and other marine animals rely on it.
Millions of state and federal dollars are being poured into dozens of projects ranging from stormwater treatment upgrades to filtration systems that remove harmful nitrates from water flowing into the Indian River Lagoon, the vast East Coast estuary where manatees congregate in winter. Seagrass beds have been replanted.
There have been 505 manatee deaths recorded this year between January 1 and November 24. That compares with 748 in the same time frame in 2022 and 1,027 the year before, according to the nature commission. The total manatee population in Florida is estimated at between 8,350 and 11,730 animals.
Agencies are unwilling to declare the hunger problem solved and plan to closely monitor the manatees and their environment to decide whether feeding or other steps are needed.
“Feeding wildlife is a temporary emergency intervention and conservation measures such as habitat restoration, improving habitat access and increasing capacity for rehabilitation are considered long-term solutions,” the Florida Wildlife Agency said in its notice.
Meanwhile, environmental groups are pushing to relist the manatee as an endangered species, a classification higher than endangered that offers more protection. A petition filed with the Fish and Wildlife Service requesting the change says it was a mistake to take manatees off the endangered list in 2017, where they had been since 1973.
The agency first concluded in October that it may be justified to put the manatee back on the endangered species list, an interim step that will require further study. Environmental groups say the move is encouraging.
“This is the right call for manatees and everyone who cares about these charming creatures,” said Ragan Whitlock, a Florida-based attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. “I applaud the Fish and Wildlife Service for taking the next step toward better safeguards. Manatees need every ounce of protection they can get.”