A boat-wounded manatee rescued Feb. 21 from Fanning Springs is in relatively good health and is scheduled to be a candidate for release into the wild in a few weeks, according to representatives from Sea World Orlando.
About a dozen volunteers and team members from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission rescued the mammal after it was noticed that the manatee had a gash on its back and was having trouble breathing. Rescuers took the animal by truck to Sea World for rehabilitation.
“It’s still at our facility and is doing well,” said Sea World communications specialist Emily Winterhalter in a phone interview Wednesday.
The manatee, a large adult male, was in the last week taken off of his feeding tube, Winterhalter wrote in a later email. He has been eating well, and is no longer on medications.
According to Winterhalter, the animal suffered six broken ribs when it was struck by watercraft a day or so before it was rescued. And those ribs still need to heal.
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