Mantee Viewing at Tampa Power

In 1986 when the Tampa Power plant began discharging warm water into a cove in Tampa Bay, they started noticing that when the weather was cold, the manatees began to congregate there. 


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All the black spots you see are manatees

Now as many as 300 manatee have been counted in this area, and it has become a National Manatee Refuge.

 

There are walkways along the bay that allow the public to see the manatees up close.

There is a walkway through the mangroves

that extends out into the bay

where you can see huge fish and all kinds of birds

Snowy Egret

Herons

and pelicans, to name a few.

 

You follow Interpretive signs and recorded information messages throughout the walk.  For instance, manatees must leave the cove and go to the bay to find sea grasses to eat, and consume approximately 10% of their body weight daily.  They are vegetarians, carry their babies for 13 months, the babies are about 3' long at birth and weigh about 60 pounds, and calves remain close to their mothers for about two years.

There are fun things to do, a museum, and large picnic area.  There is no admission charged for any of the park, even for parking.

There is even an electric car charging station (not free, however).

Manatees in the Englewood Canal

We are back in Florida for a couple of weeks, sending my folks off to Alaska next week, and then cleaning and organizing and closing the house here for the summer.  Today dawned sunny and warm, so we decided to exercise the boat before putting it away for the season.

We decided to head out for Venice to our favorite restaurant on the water.

A lot of the channel markers have Osprey nests - this one had an adult and three babies.

A sailboat behind us in the intercoastal waterway had to wait for the Venice Island bridge to open. 

We ate at the restaurant in the background after finding a place to dock the boat on the big dock at the marina.

We spotted a Mangrove area full of white egrets, so slowed down to observe them.  That is when we noticed a big animal in the water.  

It actually looked like two big animals - we watched a while longer and realized it was Manatees coming out of the water to eat the mangrove leaves.

It is really hard to get a good picture of a manatee - they are very shy and just come out of the water for an instant at a time.  So it was very special to watch them eating when they made their brief appearances.