APOLLO BEACH, Fla. — Federal officials are in the process of deciding if the West Indian manatee will return to the endangered species list.

It’s been a rough couple of years for Florida’s manatees.

What You Need To Know

  • Florida's manatee population had a rough year in 2021 with 1,101 deaths 

  • Federal officials reviewing if West Indian manatee should be on endangered list once again 

  • They have been listed as "threatened" for the past seven years

They were reclassified as a threatened species in 2017 despite opposition from environmental groups. As sea grass beds continued to deplete on parts of the east coast, more than 1,100 manatees died in 2021. Last year wasn’t much better and wildlife officials resorted to hand-feeding some wild manatees to help fend off starvation.

A big issue in addition to lack of food sources includes red tide blooms, boat strikes, and cold winter months.

ZooTampa’s manatee rehabilitation team has 19 manatee they’re working with right now in hopes of soon releasing them to the wild.

“They can live a really long time so hopefully we can get them back out there and they can make more babies and there will be more manatees in the future,” explained Animal Care Manager Molly Lippincott.

One of their manatees that’s currently in critical care, the team named Roberta after she was rescued from Roberts Bay. Roberta was found with a boat strike, wrapped in fishing line and suffering from internal injuries.

Lippincott says their team is as hands off with manatees like Roberta as possible, so they won’t become reliant on people to survive.

“We don’t do any training, hand feeding, any petting of any kind,” she said. “They will become used to people and unfortunately, most of their problems have been created by people.”

According to federal law, the wildlife services have one year to make a decision.