The Columbus Zoo welcomed four new, rescued manatees into the zoo family over the weekend. This marks the 19th endangered manatee release the zoo has facilitated, but the first time it has housed twin manatees.
“It looks like a chubby walrus,” Emma Foulk of Reynoldsburg said.
“Kind of like walruses with no little tusks,” Finn and Sutton Donohew of Blacklick said.
These were common reactions from kids walking through the Columbus Zoo looking at its newest arrivals.
“I'm getting goosebumps just talking about it. These guys are amazing and twins are exceptionally rare. It's a one percent chance that you're going to have twins out there. Their survival has got to be even less,” the zoo keeper at the Manatee Coast exhibit, Dan Nellis said.
The twins, Millennium and Falcon, became orphaned when their mother suffered fatal boat-related injuries in Florida. The Columbus Zoo's long-term resident female manatee, Stubby, will serve as their surrogate mother.
“They're swimming around, having a good time right now. And stubby is kicking it back into gear and doing her job right now,” Nellis said.
“They were swimming together and I kind of thought it was really cute because it looked like they were holding hands,” Foulk added,
With the new arrivals to feed and more water to filter, the Columbus zoo is dedicating its annual Giving Tuesday as a fundraiser to the baby manatees.
“It's a 300,000-gallon system. We were over 10 cases of lettuce just yesterday and these guys are starting slow,” Nellis said.
Right now, the twins weigh about 150 pounds. They need to hit 600 pounds before being released into the wild, so they are expected to be here for a couple of seasons.
Cadbury is the latest manatee rehabilitated at the Columbus Zoo in route to being released in the Florida Keys and you can track him here.