Lil Joe the manatee needs an agent for the unfolding story of his life, which continues to amaze and now includes an unexpected reunion with an old pal.
Lil Joe was plucked recently from a shallow river in central Florida, where he had been marooned and starving for weeks. He was so dehydrated and underweight that the knobs and recesses of his skull were strikingly visible, his ribs were bulging and the loose skin of his concave belly was bunched up.
He was taken back to SeaWorld Orlando, where he had lived as an orphaned newborn, and was reunited with Slip, his longtime aquarium mate. The two manatees, who first met nearly 20 years ago, were kindred spirits during years of touring the nation before they were set free together a little more than two years ago.
Now, when they aren't performing balletic corkscrews in their SeaWorld tank, the reconnected manatees are between them devouring 200 heads of restaurant-grade romaine lettuce each day. And if they aren't thinking about things as humans might, they might at least be feeling a primal tug that amounts to: "What's next?"
Lil Joe was first rescued from the Halifax River near Daytona Beach on July 30, 1989, weeks old and weighing 42 pounds. With his mother presumed dead, Lil Joe would gain fans at SeaWorld as a pudgy, bottle-raised orphan. He was even fed once by President George H.W. Bush.
Slip, named after the marina spaces where boats dock, was born at SeaWorld on Nov. 22, 1991. His mother, Marina, had been rescued in 1979 and was SeaWorld's first bottle-raised calf. She died of complications three weeks after his birth.
The two orphans grew close, perhaps not by choice but as a result of the protocols for rearing captive members of the endangered species.
Biologists thought then that orphaned calves reared in captivity would never acquire the skills needed to survive in the wild. So they sent them off together for years of adventure. First stop: SeaWorld in San Diego. Next, the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, where they wowed visitors for four years. It was there that Lil Joe bulked up to a weight of 1,950 pounds, or nearly a ton.
In 2009, the two were shipped to the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa and introduced to the kinds of river plants that manatees ordinarily eat. The science of manatee care had evolved as Slip and Lil Joe grew, and biologists at that point were confident the two could be released.
So on Feb. 15, 2010, they were set free at Blue Spring on the St. Johns River, where the relatively warm spring water attracts hundreds of manatees each winter. The two had apparently had enough of each other and went their separate ways.
Lil Joe turned up a few months later farther north in the St. Johns, stunned by cold weather. He was rescued, rehabbed and put back into the river several months later. Then, as winter approached last year, he slipped out of his radio-tracking belt and disappeared. Lil Joe was feared dead.
Meanwhile, on Jan. 4, Slip was hauled from Crescent Lake, which connects to the St. Johns River. Stressed by cold, he was taken back to SeaWorld Orlando, about 60 miles to the south.
By then, it seemed the Slip-Lil Joe relationship was no more. But in August, a manatee appeared in the Little Econlockhatchee River ? 25 miles upriver from the St. Johns, a highly unusual place for a sea cow to go.
A few weeks later, a wildlife volunteer spotted an "R 5" brand on the animal's back, confirming it was Lil Joe. (Slip is "R 1.") State biologists suspected that the river had receded after early summer rains, trapping Lil Joe.
Steve Lehr, assistant curator of mammals at SeaWorld, said the manatee was ailing when he was rescued Sept. 27. He tipped the scale at just 1,010 pounds, little more than half his Ohio weight. He was tube-fed water for a few days, then a watery gruel of mashed romaine lettuce and high-protein monkey chow.
Lehr said that at 10 feet 8 inches in length, Lil Joe should weigh at least 1,500 pounds. (Slip is 9 feet 10 inches, and doing well now.) Getting Lil Joe to tip the scale at that weight, however, will require the consumption of many more thousands of heads of romaine.
Until then, Lil Joe and Slip are together again.
kspear@tribune.com
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