GA4

Thursday, May 19, 2005

AMAZONIAN MANATEES - Paper, website and webcam

It's been a while since I posted anything about the Amazonian Manatee, so here's a few links.

Here's a recently published scientific research paper entitled Phylogeography and population genetics of the endangered Amazonian manatee available as PDF or Google's HTML cache. It has a very positive conclusion.
Although classified on the Endangered Species List, the Amazonian manatee has maintained relatively high genetic variability, and the genetic signature of an expanding population might be an indication of recovery in the last 30–40 years after a 200-year period of heavy exploitation.
This BBC Science and Nature article is titled Manatees that capture the imagination.

And finally, here's a link to a Florida Manatee WebCam. OK, so this isn't an Amazonian Manatee, but it's still nice to see a closely related animal on the move. I've not seen them myself yet, just fish so far...