Florida manatees face severe threats from boat propeller strikes and cold stress syndrome, with welfare implications for individual animals that are among the most studied large mammals in US waters.
Manatees struck by boat propellers suffer catastrophic injuries — deep lacerations through blubber and muscle that, in survivors, cause prolonged pain, infection risk, and scarring that permanently affects their appearance and potentially their hydrodynamic efficiency. Cold stress syndrome causes progressive immune failure, respiratory infections, and in severe cases death from pneumonia — a prolonged and serious welfare harm. The 2021-2022 starvation event caused by seagrass die-off represented one of the largest wildlife welfare crises in recent US history, with thousands of individual manatees experiencing starvation. Rehabilitation programmes provide intensive care for affected individuals, including warming, nutritional support, and wound management, with successful return to the wild for many animals.