Florida Manatees are gentle and slow-moving sea creatures, whose closest living relative is the elephant. Actually called West Indian Manatees, they are vegetarians, eating up to 150 pounds of plants a day. Their greatest threat is speedboats.
Common name: Florida Manatee
Scientific name: Trichechus manatus latirostris
Estimated Population: A minimum of 2,222 individuals as of early 2000
Range: Found throughout rivers, springs, and shallow coastal waters of Florida and adjacent states.
Congressional budget cuts are crippling protection of endangered
Florida manatees. Proposals call for as much as a 50 percent funding
cut for manatee research headquartered in Orlando. This would end
10 years of satellite tracking, at a time when annual manatee mortality
has hit new heights. Only 1,800 Florida manatees survive.
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