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Meet the Florida Fab Five!
Biographies for the Manatees You'll
Track in Spring 2004
| Actual:
Capture Date: 1/24/02
Gender: Female
Capture Location: Port of the Islands (25.958N,
-81.509W)
Background: Actual has been tagged since 2002, and it will be
interesting to see if she displays any different migration patterns
this year. Actual as you know, has exhibited a very small home range
over the last 2 years. She has consistently used the area around
Round Key for feeding and makes very regular trips back to POI for
freshwater. She uses POI for her winter site as well. This past
summer we began to see her make trips to the Cape Romano grassbeds,
which is the biggest move she has made since her capture! She would
then come back to Round Key and POI.
Actual
was captured and radio-tagged at Port of the Islands on 24 January
2002. She is a medium sized female and was captured with her small
female calf. She weighed 980 pounds with a total length of 298 cm.
She only has one very old gray scar on her ( a welcome site). Her
calf weighed 265 pounds with a total length of 170 cm.
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| Anna:
Capture Date: 3/21/01
Gender: Female
Capture Location: Port of the Islands (25.958N,
-81.509W)
Background: Anna has proven to be one of the females that travels
the most during winter, and so it will be interesting to see if
she continues this during this season too. During
strong cold fronts she will move from the TTI into Whitewater Bay
in the most southern Everglades area. As temperatures rise again,
she comes back to the TTI/POI area. She is the only female who has
regularly exhibited these movements. Throughout the rest of the
year her home range for feeding areas are Whitehorse and Gullivan
Keys pretty consistently, as well as Gullivan Bay and the grassbeds
of Cape Romano. Throughout the year she makes regular trips to POI
for freshwater.
Anna
was originally captured and tagged at POI on 21 March 2001. She
is a large adult female (314cm long and weighed 1,270 pounds at
time of capture) and had a large calf with her at the time of capture.
By the end of May 2001 she had weaned her calf. We have successfully
tracked her since her original tagging date and have learned that
some of her favorite spots in spring and summer are around Turtle,
Gullivan and Hog Keys, which are all part of the Ten Thousand Islands
area and the Gullivan Bay/Cape Romano area.
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| Belvedere:
Capture Date: 1/15/04
Gender: Male
Capture Location: Port
of the Islands (25.958N, -81.509W)
Background: Belvedere has never been captured before, so it
will be an adventure to track him since we really don't know what
to expect. Total length at capture was 312 cm, and weight was 1089
lbs.
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Sorry,
camera shy so far |
| Giffer:
Capture Date: 1/16/04
Gender: Male
Capture Location: Port of the Islands
(25.958N, -81.509W)
Background: Right
after his capture and release, Giffer really went on the move, traveling
quite a bit of distance right away. It will be interesting to see
if he keeps this up, since he has never been captured or tracked
before! Total length at capture was 267 cm., but we weren't able
to get a weight as the scale malfucntioned that day.
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Sorry,
camera shy so far |
Leslie:
Capture Date: 3/20/01
Gender: Female
Capture Location: Port of the Islands (25.958N,
-81.509W)
Background: Leslie
is a large female manatee that was captured at Port of the Islands
on March 20, 2001. At the time of capture she weighed 1430 pounds
and had a total length of 312 cm. At capture, Leslie was pregnant.
In
May 2001 she was spotted for the first time with a very small female
calf. In November 2003, Jim Reid changed the PTT on Leslie and was
unable to verify if the calf was still with her. We suspect that
the weaning process will occur soon if it hasn't already. Because
of this, the next few visuals that we get of Leslie will be important
so that we can keep track of how long the calf stayed with her.
Leslie and TNP-11 "Anna" are the two manatees with the
longest history with us. Both have been tagged and tracked consistently
since their original captures. Both have provided us with almost
3 years of interesting data and movement patterns.
Since
her initial capture, Leslie has consistently used the areas to the
southeast of POI in the Chokoloskee Bay area. She frequently swims
up the Turner and Lopez River's for freshwater and feeds on the
seagrass beds off of the outer islands including Jewel, Demijohn,
Turtle, and Pavilion Keys in the Chokoloskee and Rabbit Key Pass
areas. She makes occasional trips back to POI as well.
Leslie
is again very unique in the area that she and her calf are using.
She has continually used the Chokoloskee area with very few trips
back to POI over the years. Her home range is the eastern Choko.
Bay area with most of her feeding taking place off Demijohn and
Jewel Keys and regular trips up the Turner and Lopez River's and
into the Cross Bays for freshwater. For the past two winters, Leslie
has chosen to go up into the canal that runs along US 41 (east of
Everglades City) during strong cold fronts rather than go back to
POI. She is the only tagged female who has exhibited these moves.
After observing her in this area the first time, we realized that
there were several cow/calf pairs using this site in winter. Leslie
was pregnant when she was captured in Mar01 and in May01 was sighted
with a small calf. At last sighting she still had her calf with
her but we expect she will wean it soon. |
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2004 Journey North. All Rights Reserved.
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