Manatees travel to manmade, natural water bodies during cold snaps

Like snowbirds, manatees travel to avoid the cold. But instead of heading south, manatees in Sarasota head north to the Tampa Electric Co. Power Plant to stay warm.

Most of the year, the warm waters of Sarasota Bay are a perfect and comfortable habitat for the seagrass grazing mammals. But when temperatures drop, there’s a mass exodus as manatees look to keep warm.

“When it starts to get colder, they get cold stressed if they don’t get to a warm water site,” Mote Marine Rehabilitation and Medical Care Manager Lynne Byrd said. “That’s why you see all these manatees congregating at power plants and springs because it’s a higher temperature.”

For the manatees that call Sarasota Bay home, the common warming destination is the TECO Power Plant at Apollo Beach. The coal-powered plant heats water to generate steam, which turns turbines, creating electricity. The steam is then rerouted to a condenser and discharged into a canal that feeds Tampa Bay. In that canal, the water is consistently about 86 degrees.

Manatees learn about the warm water bodies when they’re pups, and remember when they’re adults and the water temperature drops.

“Through history and learning from their moms, they know where to find these warm water sites,” Byrd said. “That’s the whole point of moms, right? They teach these kids for the first two years of their lives where the warm water sites are and where they can go to feed in these seagrass beds.”

The Manatee Viewing Center has become a tourist attraction for manatee lovers. TECO built the Manatee Viewing Center, which includes an observation center, boardwalks over the canal, an online-accessible camera, a cafe and gift shop.

Mote sometimes comes across manatees that have become cold stunned, taking the animals in for rehabilitation. When they are in better health, the marine research organization releases manatees into warm water sites like the TECO Power Plant to teach them what they may not have learned from their mothers, or forgotten.

“It’s really unfortunate when a mom parks her kid and doesn’t come back, and then we get these youngsters that don’t know where the warm water sites are,” Byrd said. “So when we get them into rehab, that’s part of our mission with that sized animal is to get them in good condition again and then we put them in a warm water site with all these manatees during a cold spell and the thought is they’ll learn from those animals.”