After 13 months, the female gives birth to a baby and nurses it for two years. She can only have a calf once every three years. Manatees can live to be 30 years old. There may be as few as 1,000 manatees left in all of Florida. Their very existence is threatened by careless boaters, who maim and kill them with their outboard propellers.
Scientists say the population is in decline.
A slow and gentle animal such as the manatee can not be allowed to go extinct. From Florida south to Brazil.