Pine and Forest Return to the Wild

Valerie Gohlke (at right), SMC's Catalog Department Manager, helps Monica Ross, a biologist from Wildlife Trust, attach a tracking belt to Forest before he is released at Blue Spring State Park in Orange City, FL.

By Suzanne Tarr,
Save the Manatee Club Staff Biologist

On February 18, 2003, Pine and Forest, two female manatees were returned to the wild at Blue Spring State Park and Save the Manatee Club (SMC) was there to lend a hand!

On January 11, 2002, staff from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWCC), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and Sea World Florida (SWF) rescued Pine and Forest from the cold waters of the Ortega River. When waters fall below 68 degrees, most manatees move to warm water refuges like Blue Springs State Park or other warm water discharges along Florida’s east coast. For some reason, these two females didn’t leave the area in time and when they were rescued, both exhibited signs of cold stress and were emaciated.

Pine and Forest were taken to Sea World where they were rehabilitated for months. In July, they were moved to Disney’s Living Seas exhibit at Epcot where visitors could watch them rest, play, and swim together. Finally, their day had come and they were fat, healthy, and healed. In other words, they were ready to return to the wild.

Disney crews carefully loaded Pine and Forest into a padded truck and headed up the highway to nearby Blue Springs State Park. The doors rolled up and SMC staff helped unload these two big females! We carefully carried each manatee on a stretcher down to the beach where Monica Ross, a biologist from Wildlife Trust, was waiting with telemetry tracking gear. Researchers attach tags to manatees returning to the wild. This way, caretakers can ensure rehabilitated and released manatees are readjusting to the wild. After a final check on the manatees and the gear, we helped lift the stretchers and made our way down to the water. In just a few seconds, Pine and Forest were successfully released back into the wild! Monica will monitor Pine and Forest for at least a year. In addition, these two manatees will be captured in a few months so they can get a full health assessment. We hope that Pine and Forest quickly get back to being perfectly wild.

Would you like to “track” Pine and Forest’s progress? Please visit our fellow Manatee Rehabilitation Partners at http://www.wildtracks.org and find out where Pine and Forest are today!

Learn more about manatee research and manatee tracking by visiting the following Web sites:

Florida Marine Research Institute

U.S. Geological Survey, Sirenia Project

Wildtracks.org