The Status of the Manatee in the Everglades National Park, with Notes on Its Natural History

Abstract

As long as fifty-five years ago biologists had begun to write with concern (Bangs, 1895: 786) for the survival of the Florida manatee, Trichechus manatus latirostris. Impressed by the number killed in the 1940 freeze, Cahn (1940: 222) considered the survival of the species to be seriously threatened. Two years later Glover Allen (1942: 544) included the Florida manatee in his EXTINCT AND VANISHING MAMMALS OF THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE, and Gordon Gunter (1942: 89) wrote: For years it has been a matter of common knowledge with conservationists and mammalogists that manatees are very uncommon in the United States. Many have shared their concern, and many have looked forward to the recent establishment of the Everglades National Park with the hope that it should provide for the indefinite survival of this interesting creature. It seems fitting, therefore, that this early opportunity be taken to report on the apparent status of the manatee in this park, and to record such information on its natural history as is at hand. Observations were begun in May, 1949, and continued through April, 1950. Much credit is due park superintendent Daniel B. Beard for setting up a position in the Park which provided the opportunity for this study, and for the interest and enthusiasm with which he encouraged its progress. Park warden Marcus B. Parker, a keen and intelligent observer with long years of experience in the area as a warden for the National Audubon Society before the Park was established, and park ranger Ralph D. Maxwell, a well-trained wildlife management graduate, recorded and contributed many field observations. Others who provided sight records are Paul Barnes, David Bogart, J. B. Earle, John Rohn, Earl Semingsen, and Erwin Winte of the Ranger staff, Lamar Johnson of West Palm Beach, Burton Hunt of the University of Miami, Charles M. Brookfield and Jay A. Weber of Miami, charter boatman Lewis C. Watson, and local fishermen H. B. Brewer, Rollin Davis, Joseph Douthitt, C. E. Saunders, Art Eiffler, and Fred Woodard. W. M. Buswell of the University of Miami identified a food plant. The MIAMI HERALD newspaper gave courteous access to its clipping files. Lester Leigh in a letter of May 7, 1950, provided measurements of a six-foot male Florida manatee in his care in the South Florida Museum at Bradenton. Special acknowledgment is made to Claude Lowe of Tavernier who generously contributed his carefully recorded notes on the birth of a manatee, and measurements of the parous female. The Everglades National Park at this writing (April, 1950) includes some 1,228,500 acres on and about the southernmost projection of the mainland of Florida and of the United States, between latitudes 24? 50' and 25? 45'. It may be divided into three very distinct parts, grossly equal in area: the sawgrass glades, the mangrove swamps, and Florida Bay. The glades concern us only indirectly here. This expanse of open sawgrass marsh, frequently dotted with tree 22 Vol. 32, No. 1