Nature
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Conservation projects can be tough, often in extreme conditions, against all odds, and even with species right on the brink of extinction. However, they can also be extremely successful, with protected areas and laws leading population numbers to bounce back. One area where this is happening is Blue Spring State Park in Florida, now home to lots and lots of manatees.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.The park is especially useful for the manatees as it provides warm water in the cooler winter months. While they may look large and cuddly, manatees have limited body fat and otherwise struggle to keep warm. The temperatures at Blue Spring stay at a pretty consistent 22°C (72°F), helping the manatees stay toasty.
However, in 1970, the park was found to have just 14 manatees during the spring run. These gentle creatures have faced a multitude of threats before and since that time, including boat strikes, water pollution, algal blooms, and a shortage of their main food source, seagrass. They were listed on the Endangered Species Act as "endangered" all the way from its creation through to 2017, when they were downlisted to "threatened" (though still protected).
Save The Manatee Club has worked within Blue Spring to conduct research on the manatee population there since the 1980s. Each year, the team identifies and records photographs of the manatees, including scar images, and carefully reviews footage of manatees in the park. They keep an eye on calves, monitor for illnesses like cold stress, and help with rescues and releases.
By 2005, the number of manatees at Blue Spring had risen to over 200, and now, in 2025, the team recorded 736 adults and 80 calves. Andi Cross, co-founder and expedition lead divemaster of Edges of Earth, shared footage of her visit to the park with Wayne Hartley from the Save The Manatee Club.
There were "over 700 manatees packed into the crystal-clear run, the largest aggregation ever recorded here," Cross told Discover Wildlife.
The Fish and Wildlife Service reports that in the entire state of Florida, there were around 1,267 manatees in 1991 – now that number has risen to around 8,350. Manatees remain federally protected under both the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
