Webcams

Watch manatees on underwater and above-water webcams at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park and Blue Spring State Park.

Webcam videos available, too! Scroll down to the bottom of the page.

Underwater Webcam at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park

Above-Water Webcam at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park

Please Note: The weather is warmer in Florida, and the gates have been closed at the park. The park’s resident manatees — Ariel, Betsy, and Electra — are now roaming the spring, so you may see them on the webcams! These are captive, permanent resident manatees who are non-releasable. The best time to see them is when they are being fed: 8:00 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m., and 3:30 p.m. EST. You may see them eating lettuce, which is part of their diet at the park. Please do not feed lettuce or anything else to wild manatees.

Learn About Homosassa Springs

Betsy the manatee — Betsy is one of the resident manatees at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park.

At Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park, visitors can see manatees both in the in-ground pool at the Manatee Care Center and beneath the surface of the spring bowl in the Underwater Observatory. Manatees can be seen in the entire spring above the water, too. Manatees are a subtropical species and cannot tolerate water temperatures below 68 degrees F. The park’s natural freshwater spring bowl remains a constant 72-degree temperature year-round, serving as vital habitat for manatees and various species of fish who enter from the river. Two captive manatees, who cannot be released into the wild, remain at the park year-round, enhancing the park’s daily manatee education programs. These manatees — Ariel and Betsy — are in Save the Manatee Club’s Adopt-A-Manatee® program.

Save the Manatee Club has a historic partnership with Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park, dating to 1989 when the Club’s Adopt-A-Manatee program began, and is grateful to the park for this partnership and the wonderful care they give to the manatees. Save the Manatee Club has provided funding for a spring run gate at the park that allows wild manatees to swim into the main spring area, which acts as an important source of warmth in the winter. The Club has also funded heating support tanks, used to treat manatees with cold stress; veterinary care; and the park’s “Manatee Watch” pontoon boat, used for rescues.

Watch Highlights Videos

Underwater Highlights from the Homosassa Springs Webcams

Above-Water Highlights from the Homosassa Springs Webcams

Underwater Webcam Highlights at Blue Spring State Park

Above-Water Webcam Highlights at Blue Spring State Park

Please Note: The weather is warmer in Florida, and Manatee Season at Blue Spring State Park ended on March 16th. We are currently playing webcam highlights videos from previous seasons. At night, we will also be playing highlights videos. You can also scroll down the page to see past manatee videos from the web cams. Any people seen in the videos are researchers or other individuals with special permission.

Latest Manatee Update

March 12, 2020:

The river temp was 70° F (21° C). One manatee was in, and it was our recently released individual. I think the season is over. Though I will watch the last week of March and the first week of April closely.
— Wayne Hartley, Manatee Specialist

Read more manatee updates from this season at Blue Spring State Park by clicking the blue Get Manatee Updates box below and click the Webcam Videos box to see manatee video clips from this season.

Please call Blue Spring State Park before you visit to get the latest manatee count at the park: 386-775-3663.

Get Manatee Updates, Scar Charts, and Learn About Blue Spring

Support for the Manatee Webcams at Blue Spring State Park was made possible by a donation to Save the Manatee Club as a memorial gift in honor of the late Mrs. Norma Norton, a Florida resident who cared deeply for manatees.

Read Manatee Updates from this season as well as past seasons.
Identify manatees in the Club’s adoption program using Wayne Hartley’s Scar Pattern Chart (pdf).
See Wayne’s Scar Charts for all of the Blue Spring manatees (pdf).
Learn about Blue Spring State Park and why it is vital habitat for manatees.
Check out our Species Spotlight to learn about other living things that share the manatee’s habitat at Blue Spring (pdf).