With my snorkel-masked face in the water, I spotted a manatee on the far side of the spring. Its back was to me, and it wasn't moving. Sleeping, I thought. I turned around to look for my group and raised my head out of the water in time to hear my tour leader citing warnings to someone.

"You're not supposed to bother manatees when they're asleep," Captain Joe Detrick was saying to a large man with his family. I recognized the family, who had arrived on their own boat at this Three Sisters Springs area of Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge. "If a wildlife officer catches you harassing a manatee," Capt. Joe said, "you can be fined $500 and go to jail for 60 days."

"What agency are you with?" The large man countered.

"I'm not with an agency," Capt. Joe said. "But I'm out here every day, and I know a lot of the officers."

"Well, you take care of your own money, and I'll worry about mine," the large man said. And he led his children over to the sleeping manatee, diving down to it.

This encounter illustrates the problem that many people have with snorkeling around Florida's West Indian manatees. Too many people don't know enough about manatees - an endangered mammal that numbers about 3,000 -- and what their needs for survival are. Or people know, but just don't care.

It's a real concern to Capt. Joe, who really loves these gentle giants. His company, Fun 2 Dive Scuba, provides educational tours about manatees. He takes his guests to see manatees 7 days a week from October until March -- the prime time to see them.

Our tour started at 6 a.m. at Capt. Joe's shop in Sanford. The shop is also where he begins educating his guests with a talk in his down-home manner of speaking and with a video produced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The video displays the threats to manatees: habitat loss, pollution, boat collisions and other dangers, as well as rules about interacting with manatees.

Gathered around the table were only 4 of us. Capt. Joe limits his tours to 6 people, although he said there is no regulation on how many people licensed tour operators can accommodate. Capt. Joe showed us his own video of a tour operator taking about 40 people out to see the manatees - surely not enjoyable for the manatees or the guests, I thought.

Helping out was NAUI (National Association of Underwater Instructors) master diver Bob Pollack, Capt. Joe's assistant, whose job was to aid guests, dispense knowledge and make jokes about Capt. Joe throughout the day.

In about a half-hour, our group was driving down country roads toward Crystal River NWR. We stopped for breakfast, then headed toward Twin River Marina, where Capt. Joe's custom-made SeaArk was promptly brought out.

Idling eastward in the boat, Capt. Joe told us how to watch for manatees in the water - by sighting a swirling motion on the surface.

Capt. Joe sighted a manatee. Bob pointed out manatees, too. Along the "river," which looked more like a canal to me, we began to see more and more manatees. Some looked like huge gray potatoes floating under the surface, while others brought their whiskered snouts up for air with a phfoooosheh.

Twenty minutes after getting in the boat, we were at Three Sisters Springs. Capt. Joe anchored the boat near a spring that was roped off just for the manatees. He warned us not to even approach the rope, as he had witnessed how a few people hanging on the rope soon led to a crowd hanging on the rope.

A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service volunteer, known only as Gus, came up on a yellow kayak. He was there to answer questions and give out brochures about how to protect the manatees. He and Capt. Joe exchanged their familiar hellos.

The last one out of the boat, I was apprehensive. I didn't want to come close to any manatees. I didn't want to harass them. I didn't want to snuggle up to their cute faces. I didn't want to be like the woman in an article I read who announced she didn't see any manatees while she unknowingly stood on top of one.

I just wanted a glimpse of them in their world. I had seen manatees before, but not while in the water with them. I wanted to understand them.

Bob coached me around the roped-off area in the cold canal toward the warm spring, in which visibility instantly improved. A manatee was there! And there! Past the rope, I could see a manatee congregation, all with their rounded backs and tails to us. One manatee swam in my direction. I backed up.

Then a surprising feeling came over me: I was afraid.

A 10-foot manatee swam under me. Slowly. This creature was twice as big as myself. I knew rationally there was no reason for me to be afraid of manatees. They don't bite, sting or whack. They eat vegetation. But they are so big that my first encounter with one really scared the un-rational side of my brain. What if the manatee decided to surface for air at that point? I'd be on top of it. What if my flipper hurt the manatee? I'd never forgive myself.

These fears disappeared in 10 minutes. Manatees are indeed big, but that's one of their defense mechanisms. In no time, I was practically one of them.

A small manatee approached a member of the group. The manatee put its face up to the man's mask. Then the calf swam over to another person not from our group. The manatee seemed to be introducing itself to each person there. When the manatee came up to me, I froze and let it sniff me - like a dog. It must not have liked me very much because it was soon on to the next person.

Bob said, "The young manatees are curious. It's usually the young ones that approach you. The older ones don't usually approach people because they've seen people already and aren't curious anymore."

At the time of the tour, news about the manatee death count for 2000 had just come out: at least 273. It was staggeringly bad news. But seeing this calf, and lots of other calves, was encouraging to me. It was a special sight to see a cow and her calf swimming together and nuzzling.

When I got back in the boat, I realized I must have been in the water for 3 hours. The cool temperature chilled my wet body to the bone. I waited for the others in the group to get their fill of snorkeling before we had to take the boat back to the marina by 4:30.

Not a person who likes to invade wildlife habitats, I didn't know how I would feel about snorkeling around manatees until I went. And then I discovered: frightened, then happy, then dismayed at some people's behavior. Sure, it was a fun time, but was I a better person for having swum with the manatees? I think so. I now know how truly gentle they are, despite their overwhelming size. I now know what their scars really look like. I know better how unique they are. And like many who snorkel with manatees, I am spreading the message that they're special and need to be protected.

Joe Detrick is a former U.S. Coast Guard captain who is NAUI certified. Besides manatee snorkeling tours, he offers scuba lessons and charters in the ocean or in rivers. You can contact him at:

Fun 2 Dive Scuba
407-323-6714
888-588-DIVE
www.fun2dive.com

Observing manatees from a distance is the best way to protect manatees (and any wildlife) during human encounters. When you're in known manatee areas, please follow these guidelines to safeguard these gentle giants and to avoid getting fined:

• Don't enter designated manatee sanctuaries, which are in effect from Nov. 15 through March 31.
  
• When operating a boat, follow posted idle and slow speed zones. Wear polarized sunglasses, which reduce glare and help you see manatees more easily. Don't discard any litter (like fishing line) into the water. Keep your distance from any manatees you see, and avoid boating in areas where manatees feed and rest (like seagrass beds and springs).
  
• When in the water, observe manatees from a distance, and only from the surface of the water. Never dive down under the water to observe manatees. And definitely never feed, poke, chase, ride or otherwise disturb manatees in any way. Manatees spend about 8 hours a day eating, and more sleeping, so you can see that harassing them takes away from these vital activities.
  
• Avoid splashing the water, which can startle manatees.
  
• Never feed manatees or any wildlife.

If you see someone not minding his or her manatee manners, report that person's behavior to an officer. You can find these rules of the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act in a manatee fact sheet by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Please see the EcoFlorida Ecotour Directory for more Florida ecotours.

from the spring 2001 issue of EcoFlorida