BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. – Brevard Zoo announced its manatee rescue and rehabilitation expansion on Monday.
Wildlife officials have been trying to find solutions to the unusual manatee mortality event. Brevard Zoo officials said that as a result of grant funding and donations, they’re now able to begin construction of the zoo’s new manatee rehabilitation facility.
The Brevard Zoo already helps with manatee rescues, but now with the facility, they’ll be able to help out in more ways than one.
A manatee rehabilitation facility has been a passion project for the zoo’s director of conservation, Jody Cassell.
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“Anybody that spent any time reading newspapers, social media, you know, the news just knows that with the loss of seagrass, with all of the different water quality issues that we’re having right now, it’s been a really rough go for manatees,” Cassell said.
In a release, Brevard Zoo said Brevard County is at the center of a historic wave of manatee deaths in recent years. The Florida Fish and Wildlife conservation commission reported 346 manatee deaths in Brevard County alone for 2022. So far in 2023, the number of manatee mortalities in Brevard County is 12.
“The animals that we are going to have here at the acute care facility are ones that need a little bit more time and rehab,” Cassell said.
Cassell said their staff is preparing for the construction and the eventual arrival of their first manatee.
“We are adding to the team here, and we are also adding to infrastructure,” Cassell said. “So that means we needed a place to put a lot of lettuce. That means that we’re adding tanks.”
The only other facilities are in Orlando and Jacksonville. Cassell said keeping the manatees closer to home will make their rescue a little less stressful.
“Those first few hours are just really critical to get them the care that they need as soon as they become patients at a rehabilitation center, so being located right here in Brevard, it’s going to be a very short transport out of the water and into the rehabilitation center,” Cassell said.
The rehabilitation facility will be able to hold up to eight manatees and is expected to be up and running by the end of the year.
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