Manatees not native to Florida, say scientists, but came for the warmth

Manatees, long considered among Florida's most beloved and enchanting inhabitants, are not US natives at all, and only came to the Sunshine State for warm temperatures and clear blue waters like any other visitor, researchers have found.

- Richard Luscombe

The surprise revelation by scientists at the University of South Florida (USF) and George Washington University (GWU) upends decades of thinking about the origins of the threatened species, once plentiful around the Florida peninsula, the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean.

The finding could also offer a pathway to the survival of the mammals known as sea cows, of which fewer than 9,000 are believed to inhabit Florida's waterways.

Thomas Pluckhahn, professor of anthropology at USF, pointed to a remarkable rebound in numbers of bowhead whales, following conservation efforts fuelled at least in part by a better understanding of the history and geography of that species. "Biologists often try to set targets for management based on historical baselines, but a lot of times those are just assumed rather than demonstrated. They often put a large priority on native species," he said. "Historical records could be useful for manatees' management, maybe trying to take a more granular approach to the population histories and using those to set targets.