The Manatee Research Program (MRP) conducts year-round studies of manatee behavioral ecology, distribution, habitat use, genetics, and population status in Florida. The MRP also provides advice on manatee conservation and research actions throughout Florida and the wider Caribbean.

The Mote MRP is one of three organizations (along with the State of Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the U.S. Geological Survey Sirenian Project) participating via formal Memorandum of Understanding in maintaining a statewide catalog and sightings database, the Manatee Photo Identification System (MIPS). Long term aerial and photo-identification surveys throughout the year have proven valuable to local and county efforts to manage manatees in ways that attempt to balance human activities and sustainability of manatees and their habitat.

MRP Manager Dr. John Reynolds passed away on Dec. 23, 2017, after serving as a Mote Senior Scientist since 2001. He helped Mote become a beacon of conservation-focused science, particularly through his leadership of the MRP, which continues the vital mission that he championed. Read about Reynolds' life and legacy.

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Field Notes

While the diversity & severity of threats to manatees is still substantial, Floridians and agencies' collective actions have promoted generally increasing manatee numbers over the past 30 years.

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