Working with Manatees Location: EPCOT Center, Walt Disney World Day 9 by Karen Brown

There are two male manatees at the Living Seas. One is named Gene and the other is Hurricane. They live together in the same salt water exhibit. Gene was hit by a boat in 1976 on the east coast of Florida. He still has the propeller scars on his back. Conrad is not exactly sure how old Gene is but he thinks he is in his late 20's or early 30's.

Hurricane was born in 1983 at the Miami Seaquarium. They are both what are known as long term captive animals and probably will never be released to the wild. A zoo in Cincinnati, Ohio wants them and they will be going there soon.

Conrad andhis staff feed their two manatees 60-80 heads of romaine lettuce every day. Lettuce is 90% water and that is how they get their drinking water, just by eating lettuce. They have tried to give the manatees water out of a hose, but they just aren't interested in drinking out of it. Due to the fresh water they get from eating the lettuce, these manatees do not seek out fresh water sources, according to Conrad.

Sometimes they get some other vegetables to eat like carrots and kale. A treat for them is fruit. They like bananas and apples.

The manatees are very curious and friendly. Conrad said that when they try to clean their pool, the manatees come over and bother them. And the manatees will sometimes try to eat the fish food when the staff is feeding the fish!

They also get vitamins. The vitamins have to be ground up or else the manatees will spit them out. Conrad makes some gelatin, then grinds up the vitamins and grinds up monkey biscuits and mixes it all up and feeds it to the manatees. They like to eat that!

There are 6 veterinarians on staff at The Living Seas. The manatees have a physical examination every 4 months. Instead on hoisting them out of the water to examine them, Conrad just drains the water out of their pool until the doctors are finished and then he puts the water back in. The doctors weigh them and measure them. They also take blood, fecal and urine samples. Both animals are very healthy.

(If they are healthy, then why do you think Conrad does not want to let them go back to a river like Crystal River with all the other wild manatees?)

We saw some fish swimming around with the manatees. Since this is a salt water exhibit, there were salt water fish in there. We saw mullet, bonefish, pin fish, black drum, spadefish and look-down fish. We noticed that some mullets were picking at pieces of food off the manatees'skin.

How would you like to work at the Living Seas? Well, you could start planning your career there right now. Conrad says it is important to stay in school and study science. When you get to college you can apply to be in the Marine Mammal Internship program. Right now he has a staff of nine people and 3 of them are college interns. Conrad looks for juniors and seniors in college who are marine science majors or psychology majors. Also you need to be a certified scuba diver. People from all over the world are welcome to apply. Quite a few have been from California.

The interns take time off from their studies, but get college credit for the work they do. The job includes helping to get the food ready for the animals, scrub pools, and participate in the dolphins' training sessions. (They do very little training of the manatees right now. They train them just enough so they'll do what the vets want them to do when they are giving them their medical exam.)

There are also other internship programs available at The Living Seas besides the Marine Mammal Internship. You may be more interested in the Aquarium Intership or the Chemistry Internship. Also, there is an Education Internship for education majors.

Not everyone who works at the Living Seas gets paid. Some of the staff are volunteers who do it just for the love of helping the animals.

Conrad and Wayne and I hope that we have given you something to think about when you are thinking about what you want to be when you grow up. Because if you are thinking about working with manatees, there is a lot you can do!

Manatee Fun Fact: To get Gene and Hurricane's attention, Conrad splashed the water on the surface of their pool and they swam over to see him.

Conrad is telling Mrs. Brown about Gene the manatee, as Gene listens in on the conversation.

The white scars on Gene's back are propeller scars.

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