Save the Manatee Club recommends manatee gift adoptions as a thoughtful way to please moms this Mother’ Day, while also helping Florida’s endangered marine mammals.
Last year, Ken Krautheim from New Jersey adopted a real live manatee for his wife, Lesley, as a Mother’s Day gift from their two young daughters, Abigail and Elizabeth. “That was all she wanted!” exclaimed Ken. “I chose Ilya from the Club’s adoption program because he’s been spotted the closest to New Jersey, our home state.”
A tax-deductible gift adoption from Save the Manatee Club, which also includes membership in the Club, costs $25 and includes a color photo, biography, and adoption certificate of a real Florida manatee. Photos of each of the manatees up for adoption can be viewed on the Club’s website at www.savethemanatee.org. Also included with the gift adoption is a membership handbook filled with photos, facts, and information, plus subscriptions to the Club’s official quarterly newsletter, The Manatee Zone, which features updates on the manatee adoptees, and the bi-monthly e-newsletter, Paddle Tales. Educators are entitled to a discounted adoption, and also receive an Educator’s Guide, 4-color poster, and coloring and activity book (for elementary educators), in addition to standard adoption materials. Shipping is free within the United States. For $35, the gift adoption package also includes the new 2012 Club T-shirt featuring a colorful, captivating tropical design by renowned artist Nancy Blauers.
Save the Manatee Club, an international nonprofit organization, began its conservation work back in 1981 when it was established by singer/songwriter Jimmy Buffett, and former Florida Governor and U.S. Senator Bob Graham to help educate the public about the manatee’s plight. Many manatees are injured or killed each year by boat strikes. Their habitat has disappeared at a rapid rate from shoreline development, and natural springs used as warm-water refuges for wintering manatees have experienced a reduction in both water quality and spring flow due to over-development within spring sheds. Warm-water sources are necessary for the manatee’s survival in cold weather. Many manatees succumb to cold stress every year. Before this last mild Florida winter, prolonged cold weather during the last two winters killed hundreds of manatees. Currently, only about 5,000 manatees remain, concentrated year-round in Florida.
Funds from the adoption program help with manatee research, rescue, rehabilitation, and release efforts; education and public awareness projects; conservation work to protect manatees and their habitat; and programs in the United States, Central and South America, West Africa, and the Caribbean.
Patrick Rose, Executive Director of Save the Manatee Club, is pleased with the Club’s accomplishments over thirty-one years. “We have worked hard in almost every facet of manatee protection. But there’s still a big job to do before manatees are truly safeguarded for the long term.”
Ken Krautheim says, “Manatees are an important part of the ecosystem. They cannot protect themselves against human dangers such as boats and pollution – that’s our responsibility. It would be a shame to see such a gentle creature disappear forever.”
More information about manatees and gift adoptions for Mother’s Day can be found at www.savethemanatee.org, or by calling toll free at 1-800-432-JOIN (5646).
Watch manatees on the Club’s new webcams at Blue Spring State Park in Orange City, Florida. Go to www.savethemanatee.org/livecams to see the manatees and other Florida wildlife.