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Debate On Manatees' Fate Hinges On Statistics, Semantics

PAUL LAMISON / News Channel 8

A manatee swims in the water off Apollo Beach.

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By MIKE SALINERO, The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 4, 2007

TAMPA - Once again manatees face a critical vote that will decide whether they receive the highest protective status available under Florida law.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is expected to vote Wednesday on whether the state's favorite marine mammal is in danger of becoming extinct or is recovering sufficiently to be reclassified from endangered to threatened.

The commission was poised to change the manatee's classification in September, but Gov. Charlie Crist asked commissioners to postpone a decision. The governor cited the record number of manatee deaths this past year as a reason to delay changing the animal's level of protection. Crist also questioned the methods by which the commission estimates manatee population numbers.

When asked this week whether the governor would take a position on downgrading the manatee, a spokesman would not answer except to say Crist planned no additional letters to the commission.

The decision is of extreme interest to conservationists, boaters and dock and marina contractors. Dropping the manatee into the threatened class could make it harder for state officials to expand boating slow-speed zones and sanctuaries in areas the animals are known to travel and congregate.

Surveys in recent years have shown that manatee numbers have more than doubled since the state first started counting in 1991. Yet the slow-moving mammals remain at risk from boat collisions and loss of habitat.

The commission decided to re-examine the manatees' status in April 2005 based on scientific criteria it adopted from the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, an organization that monitors the world's species.

Based on the new criteria, state scientists decided the manatee was not on the brink of extinction and did not belong on the endangered list. The commission voted in June 2006 to lower the animals' status, but the reclassification does not become final unless the commission approves a new manatee management plan Wednesday.

Criteria Controversy

A controversy over how state scientists applied the international union's criteria has resurfaced as conservation groups try to maintain the manatee's endangered status. They point to a September decision by the international union to upgrade the manatee to its endangered list. Conservationists say that's proof manatees need the highest protection possible.

When wildlife commission scientists first recommended that the manatee status be changed, the Save the Manatee Club argued the state had wrongly matched the conservation union's "critically endangered" criteria with the state's "endangered" category.

"That proved our point," said Pat Rose, executive director of the Save the Manatee Club. "We were saying all along that the state was misusing the process. If you're going to use the IUCN criteria which the state adopted, you should call them endangered, not arbitrarily call them threatened."

But the state argues that the union's criteria for endangered matches the wildlife commission's threatened category. Both categories project an estimated population loss of 20 percent over the animal's next three generations, or 45 to 60 years.

"The manatee meets that middle criteria," said Kipp Frohlich, head of Fish and Wildlife's imperiled species section. "It really has to do with a difference in choice of names, not that two different groups reached very different conclusions."

Endangered Versus Threatened

Scientists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, using different scientific criteria from Florida's, also recommended earlier this year that manatees be listed as threatened instead of endangered. So far, the recommendation has not been enacted.

The service based its recommendation to lower the manatee on criteria in the federal Endangered Species Act. The act defines "endangered" as "in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range."

A species is listed as "threatened" by the federal agency if it "is likely to become an endangered species within the foreseeable future throughout all or a significant portion of its range."

Even the Save the Manatee Club agrees that two of the four regional manatee populations, the Northwest and St. Johns River groups, are doing relatively well. That's not the case with the Atlantic and Southwest groups, in which survival rates of adult animals are lower than needed to sustain population growth, according to some scientists. The Tampa Bay area is in the Southwest group.

"Basically, we don't believe the manatee today is on the brink of extinction, but there are threats out there," said Dave Hankla, field supervisor for the Fish and Wildlife Service's Jacksonville office.

Marine contractors and boating groups for years have questioned the science that kept manatees in the most-protected classification. They argue manatee numbers have slowly increased during the past two decades and more slow-speed zones and dock moratoriums are unnecessary.

"The research is very clear and overwhelming that manatees are not endangered and that statewide their population is growing at a little better than 1 percent a year," said Steven Webster, executive director of the Florida Marine Contractors Association.

"Manatees reproduce faster than humans do in Florida," Webster said. "Many people find that startling and hard to believe."

That seems at odds, however, with the conservation union's estimate that manatee populations will decline by 20 percent over the next 40 to 65 years. The union based its estimate on increasing deaths from watercraft collisions and the potential decrease in warm-water sites as power plants close or change their technology.

Record Death Count

Last year, 416 manatees died, the highest mortality rate since the state started counting in 1974. Of those deaths, 92 were caused by collisions with watercraft, 12 more than were killed by boats the previous year.

This year, 277 manatees had died by Oct. 31, 66 from watercraft collisions.

State researchers counted 2,812 manatees in Florida waters early this year, about 300 fewer animals compared with the 2006 count. Wildlife researchers always caution the counts, which primarily are done from low-flying planes, are not definitive.

Rose, with the Save the Manatee Club, cited a recent study by the U.S. Geological Survey that said there is a 50 percent chance that over the next 100 years manatee populations on either Florida coast will be reduced to 500 animals. The USGS used computer modeling based on current mortality rates.

"If you get that low, there's very little chance of ever recovering the population," Rose said. "But if you double watercraft mortality in that time frame, you're looking at almost a 96 percent chance of it being reduced to 500 on either coast."

If wildlife commissioners lower the manatees' category, the animals will continue to receive a high level of protection, Frohlich said.

"All current safeguards, protections, laws and regulations stay in place," he said. "No speed zones are going to be repealed; no fines will be reduced."

Conservation groups worry, though, that the Legislature might use the lower classification to justify cutting state funding for research or enforcement of protective measures. And lawmakers, some of whom have strong ties to development and boating groups, could pressure the commission and Department of Environmental Protection to halt creation of new sanctuaries and speed zones.

Researchers at all the agencies see watercraft as the biggest danger to manatee recovery, followed by loss of warm-water sites at power plants. An estimated two-thirds of Florida manatees winter near power plants. Scientists say if the plants close, many manatees will not know to seek another source of warm water and will die.

Reporter Mike Salinero can be reached at (813) 259-8303 or msalinero@tampatrib.com.

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