Floyd, one of Save the Manatee Club’s Blue Spring manatee adoptees, is working overtime as ambassador for his species. He is helping to raise public awareness about endangered manatees through the efforts of The American Volkssport Association (AVA), America’s premier noncompetitive sports organization. The AVA is holding its 18th AVA Biennial Convention in Orlando, Florida from April 29 – May 3, 2013, and they have chosen Floyd as their mascot.

Floyd has spent every winter at Blue Spring since birth. (Photo © Walker Stanberry)

Dennis Michele, Convention Chairman and AVA’s Southeast Region Director says, “We chose Floyd as a mascot because our convention highlights the state, and manatees are one of Florida’s best known icons. We also wanted to support Save the Manatee Club and their conservation work and are encouraging our members to adopt Floyd. Further, a donation will be presented on May 3rd by AVA organizers to Patrick Rose, the Club’s Executive Director, who will also be a convention guest speaker.”

Floyd makes a great mascot for the AVA convention because he has the reputation of being playful and active, which fits very well with the AVA’s goals of fun and fitness!

He was born in the summer of 1978, and has spent every winter at Blue Spring State Park since birth. Floyd is easily identified by Wayne Hartley, the Club’s Manatee Specialist, because of the large, crescent-shaped indentation on his side, and an old injury that left him with only half a tail. Both injuries were caused by boat strikes, which continue to be the largest known cause of manatee injuries and deaths.

The AVA is a noncompetitive sports organization with a national grassroots network of some 300 clubs conducting about 3,000 Volkssport events annually in 50 states and involving almost 400,000 participants during the most recent 2008-2010 biennial reporting period The 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization is committed to the promotion of a healthy lifestyle for people of all ages and abilities.

For more information about AVA, visit www.ava.org. For more information about their convention, visit http://ava.org/clubs/2013convention. To adopt Floyd and other manatees, go to www.savethemanatee.org/adopt. To watch the Blue Spring manatees on the Club’s webcams, go to www.manatv.org.

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