Tag Archives: underwater

Lucky / Unlucky CC The Manatee

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Today is Friday the 13th! Though superstition calls for this to be an unlucky day, my experience is it usually has a strong element of luck to it! CC the Manatee was lucky he had so many people concerned during his rehabilitation and after his release — but two weeks ago CC was unlucky enough to encounter what was thought to be a speeding boat, ending his life.

CC the Manatee Finding His Way After ReleaseFlorida manatee, Trichechus manatus latirostris, a subspecies of the West Indian manatee, endangered. February 16, 2011, CC the manatee is released for a third time. Orphaned as a small 55 pound manatee in 2006, CC goes through three releases and is rescued a few times before he is to be considred a successful release back into the wild. A few minutes after CC is released with a tracking buoy and a brand on his back he is swimming normally in the springs. Horizontal orientation blue and aqua spring waters mixing and sun rays. Three Sisters Springs, Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge, Kings Bay, Crystal River, Citrus County, Florida USA. (Carol Grant)

Orphaned and weighing only 55 pounds, CC was rescued from the Caloosahatchee River in Ft. Myers, Florida on July 1, 2006. Many manatees that small have a hard time surviving after rescue, but CC triumphed! You could call him a very lucky manatee. Continue reading →

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Something’s Fishy In The Springs

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Manatees gather together in the wintertime at various warm water sites around Florida. Some of these manatees frequent natural freshwater springs. Fish also enjoy congregating near the outflows of spring water. It is here that manatees and a number of fish species share the same watery real estate until the weather warms and manatees spread out again. While together in the springs fish often surround manatees as illustrated in this photograph:

Fish Gather Around A Manatee In The SpringsFlorida manatee, Trichechus manatus latirostris, a subspecies of the West Indian manatee, endangered. A manatee floats near a warm blue spring and submerged tree roots surrounded by fish, bream, Lepomis spp. and a mangrove snapper, Lutjanus griseus. The manatee is tolerating the bream fish attention as it is the price to pay for sharing the warm waters. Bream target dermis and dead skin on the manatee. Vertical orientation with blue water and light rays. Undisturbed, natural behavior. Three Sisters Springs, Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge, Kings Bay, Crystal River, Citrus County, Florida USA. (Carol Grant)

Interaction between fish and manatees is an interesting behavior to observe. In fact some fish, particularly bream also known as sunfish (Lepomis spp.) and sheepshead (Archosargus probatocephalus) are known to continually surround and peck at the manatee’s skin especially while they are resting. Note the bream below are nipping this manatee:

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Top 10 Cute Manatee Kids!

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Manatees are curious, gentle, charismatic, and appealing marine mammals, and manatee kids are ten-times so! Whether it’s investigating everything around and about, learning the art of flipper-turning, demonstrating new buoyancy and swimming skills, fine-tuning snout rubbing, meeting other manatees, exploring or just being the subject of its mother’s pride, manatee kid’s antics are just plan cute!

Here are my Top 10 Cute Manatee Kids (all linked from my new Oceangrant.com website that includes many additional photographs of manatee calf cuteness):

#10 – Mother Manatee with Calf Behind – How cute is this? Not only are this mother manatee and her male calf floating peacefully with beautiful reflections in the calm waters, but junior has his snout touching mom’s behind. Awwwww!Florida manatee, Trichechus manatus latirostris, a subspecies of the West Indian manatee, endangered. A calf nudges its mother while both float in warm blue spring water. A peaceful and tranquil touching scene with reflections. Horizontal orientation with beautiful light rays. Three Sisters Springs, Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge, Kings Bay, Crystal River, Citrus County, Florida USA. (Carol Grant)

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New Oceangrant Website!

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Ahhhh new beginnings, the hopeful feeling carries over into my new underwater photography website and blog that I’ve been working on — very diligently. Manatees, manatees and more manatees, the new Oceangrant site starts off with nearly 700 quality photographs, the vast majority focused on our charismatic sirenian the Florida manatee. And I have more manatee photographs to add! I believe this is the largest and best quality collection of diverse and rare images of the Florida manatee around.

PhotoShelter is the service I was interested in using for my redesigned site, and then came the release of their new cutting-edge BEAM templates. I was impressed and chose the new Shuffle design as the best way to display my varied collection of manatee images. Each of the new BEAM templates are cool in their own right, but Shuffle fascinated me with the Portfolio page that can be focused on your website visitor’s needs and interests. I have my Portfolio page divided into five categories that draw from five photo galleries out of my 14+ galleries. It’s intuitive and the structure can be picked up by playing around with it.

Here is how my new manatee portfolio page is set up: First, load time on oceangrant.com (or manatees.photoshelter.com if one finds their web address for my site) is very fast for so many photos, sized for whatever device is being used. Next, clicking on ALL pulls images from each of my featured manatee galleries. It loads them in sequence, e.g., one image from first gallery featured, one image from second, and on and on. ALL quickly displays the most diverse collection, beautifully, on any screen. Note: BEAM is still in beta so I’ve notice some bugs, especially on iPhones, but those are being worked on and the issues are disappearing systematically. Here’s a computer desktop screen shot and one from my iPad of my ALL selection. (Carol Grant) (Carol Grant)

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