Florida manatees have faced dangerous population declines from boat strikes and, more recently, an unprecedented mortality crisis from starvation as seagrass meadows collapse. Their welfare requires ecosystem-scale intervention.
Manatee welfare in the current crisis is an emergency. Animals starving as their food source collapses, injured by boat propellers, and concentrated in warm water refuges during winter are experiencing acute and chronic suffering at population scale. The immediate welfare response includes emergency feeding programs and protection of warm water refuges. The long-term welfare response requires reducing the agricultural and urban nutrient pollution that has destroyed the seagrass meadows manatees depend on. This is a case where individual animal welfare and ecosystem restoration are completely unified — you cannot protect manatee welfare without restoring manatee habitat.