6 December 7-13, 2023 miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com New Times | music | cafe | culture | Night+Day | news | letters | coNteNts | Month XX–Month XX, 2008 miaminewtimes.com MIAMI NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | FILM | ART | STAGE | NIGHT+DAY | METRO | RIPTIDE | LETTERS | CONTENTS | STAR CROSSED Activists press to remove manatees Romeo and Juliet from Seaquarium. BY ALEX DELUCA A s outcry grows from animal rights activists citing captive animals’ poor living conditions at Miami Seaquarium, the push to transport Romeo and Juliet, man- atees confined to the park for more than six decades, is gaining traction. Activists vying for Romeo and Juliet’s re- lease have implored the park to move the manatees before the end of the year. The cam- paign follows furor over a viral video posted by animal rights group UrgentSeas, which shows Romeo, believed to be 67 years old, swimming alone in a small pool at the park. The aerial footage not only triggered a stern statement from the Save the Manatee Club but also drew condemnation from leg- endary surfer Kelly Slater and Barstool owner Dave Portnoy. Those calling for Ro- meo’s removal have pleaded that the manatee be spared the same fate suffered by Lolita, an orca who died at Miami Seaquarium after spending nearly her entire life in a cramped tank at the park. A Change.org petition titled “Shut Down Miami Seaquarium and Release Romeo” and another “Set Free Romeo” have garnered more than 17,000 and 43,000 signatures, re- spectively, with more supporters piling on hour by hour. While calling for the park’s closure, animal rights group PETA says that as a long-term captive manatee, the elderly Romeo is not a candidate for release into open waters. “PETA has long pushed for the Seaquar- ium to shut down and send all the animals there — including Romeo, who can’t be re- leased in the wild — to reputable sanctuaries where they could receive the care they des- perately need, outside a tank, and we’re look- ing forward to learning more about the plan for these manatees,” PETA spokesperson Da- vid Perle tells New Times. Local10 reported this week that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said it is working with “an experienced team of manatee rescue and rehabilitation experts to assist with the transport effort of manatees from Miami Seaquarium.” Romeo was among the first manatees brought to the facility in the 1950s as part of its conservation program, which began in 1955 with the rescue of a three-week-old injured manatee named Mamie. Romeo and his long- time mate, Juliet, were the first manatees in the U.S. to conceive offspring in human care, according to the Seaquarium. As part of the park’s now-halted breeding program, Romeo produced several calves, some whom were successfully released into the wild. The park was one of five Florida facilities authorized by the Fish and Wildlife Service as a manatee “critical care facility,” according to the Seaquarium. Under its previous owner Wom- etco, which sold the park to Palace Entertain- ment in 2014, the Seaquarium veterinary staff maintained a reputation in the conservation community for working long hours to nurse in- jured and sick sea cows back to health. However, following the death of an emaci- ated manatee named Snuggles in the fall of 2021, the agency barred the park from receiv- ing rescued manatees and demoted it from a “critical care facility” to a “holding facility,” according to PETA. At the request of the Fish and Wildlife Service, Miami Seaquarium transferred some of its remaining dozen man- atees to other facilities more capable of caring for them, PETA says. Magdalena Rodriguez, a veterinarian who began working at the Seaquarium in 1997, tells New Times Romeo was a tender surrogate and teacher to younger manatees in the rescue program. Rodriguez helped manage the pro- gram until her firing from the Seaquarium in June 2021 amid internal conflict over her ob- jections to a reduction in animals’ diets. Rodriguez says Romeo would help young, rescued sea cows adapt to the seasons and eat vegetation. She recalls that he once appeared to assist a young manatee through a flume, a tube-like structure used to herd them away from pools during maintenance. “Romeo was very social,” Rodriguez says. “A young manatee was too scared to go all the way through the flume. Romeo turned around and went back to the pool, put his pads around him, and gently pushed him through the flume. He kept going back through to help the young manatee.” Large marine mammals have remained at the Seaquarium even as the park’s tank conditions deteriorated over the years, as was evident in the late Lolita’s crumbling pool. The stadium where the whale had jumped and twirled for audiences since the 1970s was shut down after Miami-Dade County issued it an unsafe structure notice in August 2021. Not long before Lolita’s death in August following a medical procedure, inspectors with the U.S. Department of Agriculture cited the park over manatees’ living conditions, un- derstaffing, and poor tank maintenance. De- spite the fact that manatees are semi-social animals that func- tion better — both medically and psy- chologically — when housed in pairs or groups, Ro- meo had been alone since the spring of 2023, according to the report. The report notes that while there have been numer- ous attempts to find Romeo another tank mate, it was ultimately determined that the facility did not meet the requirements to re- ceive another animal. “Marine mammals, whenever known to be primarily social in the wild, must be housed in their primary enclosure with at least one compatible animal of the same or biologically related species,” the report states. USDA inspectors found that because the Seaquarium did not own scales that could be used routinely at all enclosures, it hadn’t weighed three adult manatees in more than five years. The report also recounted instances where the park failed to provide manatees proper protection from weather and direct sunlight, including a lapse last spring when an overhead tarp was removed from a manatee’s enclosure for several weeks at a time, leaving it exposed to constant and direct sunlight, according to the USDA. “We know these animals’ behavior, and it’s really sad to see what they’ve been going through,” Rodriguez says. “Those tight cir- cles Romeo’s been swimming in are not a good sign.” “This park is deteriorating, yet there are still animals,” she says. She says of Romeo’s tank, “Look at that pool, look at the paint.” A Miami Seaquarium spokesperson did not respond to New Times’ request for com- ment, including questions about its status as a care facility for manatees and how many of its manatees have been successfully rescued, re- habilitated, and released to the wild. In response to a previous federal inspec- tion report citing it for poor tank conditions and animal welfare issues, the park said it stood by the quality of its animal care and had a track record of successful inspections. “Our veterinarians and animal care spe- cialists are fully dedicated to delivering the best care to all of our animals,” the Seaquar- ium said after a 2021 USDA report made na- tional headlines. Federal authorities are considering whether to once again designate the West In- dian manatee, which includes the Florida population, as an endangered species, after more than 1,100 manatees perished in 2021, marking the species’ highest Florida death toll recorded in a year. The die-off was deemed an “unusual mortality event,” a rare designation that demands immediate attention under the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act. The spike in deaths of the iconic, thousand-pound mammals was attributed to the drastic loss of their primary food source, seagrass. Rodriguez notes that the two-year survival rate for manatees released after being in long- term care is low in part because the animals tend to lack survival skills and essential social behaviors following life in captivity. If Romeo is transported to an alternate facility, the vet- erinarian who cared for Romeo for more than two decades says that his tank mate should be carefully selected to be compatible with Ro- meo in his old age. She maintains, however, that Romeo could buck the statistics and fend for himself if re- leased into the wild. “Romeo showed social tendencies and is actually a teacher,” Rodriguez says. “Romeo came in as a sub-adult...and he’d already learned survival behavior, which he contin- ued to exhibit at Seaquarium.” “So many manatees have gone through the rescue program,” she says, “Romeo might know some manatees out there in the wild.” [email protected] Miami Seaquarium rescue workers prepare to release a manatee into the Loxahatchee River at the Jonathan Dickinson State Park boat ramp in Jupiter, Florida, on June 21, 2016. Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images | METRO | “WE KNOW THESE ANIMALS’ BEHAVIOR, AND IT’S REALLY SAD TO SEE WHAT THEY’VE BEEN GOING THROUGH.”
