West Indian Manatee
Trichechus manatus
A gentle, seagrass-munching sea cow whose closest relative is the elephant.
Manatees have no natural predators, no hurry and no interest in anything except seagrass. They're slow, enormous, entirely peaceful — and their nearest living relatives aren't whales at all. They're elephants.
On the conservation status
The Florida manatee is listed as Threatened in the US. Seagrass die-offs in the Indian River Lagoon caused mass starvation events, and wildlife officials had to hand-feed wild manatees lettuce to get them through the winter.
- Length
- 2.7–3.5 m (9–12 ft)
- Weight
- 200–600 kg
- Lifespan
- 40+ years
- Diet
- Seagrass and freshwater plants
- Daily food
- About 10% of body weight
- Cold limit
- Needs water above 20°C (68°F)
The good stuff.
They're basically sea elephants
Manatees belong to the order Sirenia, whose closest land relatives are elephants and hyraxes. Look at the flipper bones and the tough, wrinkled grey skin and it starts to make sense.
Their teeth march forward
Chewing gritty seagrass wrecks teeth, so manatees grow new molars at the back that slowly conveyor-belt forward and drop out at the front. They keep replacing them for their entire lives.
They are the original mermaids
Columbus recorded sighting three mermaids in 1493 and noted they were not half as beautiful as they are painted. Sirenia — the whole order — is named after the sirens of Greek myth.
They can't handle the cold
Despite the size, manatees have very little insulating fat and get cold stress below about 20°C. In winter, hundreds crowd into warm natural springs and power plant outflows to survive.
Their scars are their names
Most adult manatees carry propeller scars. Researchers use the scar patterns to identify individuals — a heartbreaking way to run a catalogue.
They control buoyancy with burps
Manatees rise and sink by adjusting the gas in their enormous digestive system rather than by swimming. They're essentially living hot air balloons full of fermenting salad.
Wait, really?
- ✦
A manatee's flipper has fingernails — a leftover from its land-mammal ancestors.
- ✦
They have only six neck vertebrae instead of the usual seven, so they turn their whole body to look around.
- ✦
Steller's sea cow, a 9-metre Arctic relative, was hunted to extinction within 27 years of Europeans finding it.
What it sounds like
Squeaks, chirps and squeals — surprisingly high-pitched for the size. Mothers and calves call to each other constantly.
Where you might see one
Florida's springs in winter — Crystal River, Blue Spring and Three Sisters — plus the Caribbean coast down to Brazil.
The trouble
- Boat strikes
- Seagrass loss from water pollution and algal blooms
- Cold stress events
- Loss of warm-water refuges
- Entanglement in crab trap lines
One real thing
In manatee country, obey slow-speed zones — every single one of them. And never feed or give water to a wild manatee: it teaches them to approach boats, which is what gets them killed.
More ways to help