What Does Manatee Breath Smell Like?

Fun Facts About Manatees

Fun Fact 1: Manatees are adorable!

Fun Fact 2: Manatees are most closely related to elephants

Fun Fact 3: When you take a photo of a manatee, you mostly get a reflection of sky and the surrounding area and you have to take the photographer’s word that there actually is a manatee in the photo

Fun Fact 4: Manatees can weigh up to 3,000 lbs

Not So Fun Fact 5: Manatees don’t have any natural predators, but many are badly hurt or killed by boats. You almost always see long white scars on a manatee’s back from propeller injuries

Fun Fact 6: When you take a photo of a manatee below the surface of the water with your waterproof camera from a canoe or kayak, you do not get a reflection of the sky, but since you cannot see through the viewfinder while you are taking the picture, you get lots of pictures of blobs  

Or nothing  

But sometimes you get lucky…

Fun Fact 7: Gestation period for manatees is about 13 months

Fun Fact 8:  We have been privileged to see manatees on 9 separate occasions (so far!)

1. From a tour boat at Wakulla Springs State Park, Thanksgiving 

 2.  Canoeing on the Wakulla River, December 4^th  

3. Lots, kayaking on the Crystal River with GetUpAndGoKayaking, December 24^th

 

4. Lots, Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park

This place has 3 resident manatees who could not survive in the wild. They prefer iceberg lettuce but also like romaine.

In addition, wild manatees come to vacation here in the winter. The fish are not eating the manatee or vice versa; I guess they just like hanging out together

5. Several, canoeing on the Chassahowitzka River.

You are not supposed to bother or get too close to a manatee, but this one swam up to me when I was trailing my hand in the water

Fun Fact 9 : Manatee’s breath smells fishy. Even though they are vegetarians.

More on their breath - In a single breath, manatees can exchange about 90% of the air that is in their lungs (compared to about 10% for humans).  They also only breathe through their nostrils, so when they breathe in your face a blast of air hits you and you can clearly smell their breath (see above photo) 

Fun Fact 10: There are lots more fun facts about manatees but I won’t bore you with them