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Plan for manatees unveiled
The management plan would affect manatee population growth.
By CRAIG PITTMAN
Published November 10, 2006
State officials Thursday released their first-ever plan for managing manatees, another step toward dropping them from the list of endangered species. The Save the Manatee Club called the 241-page plan disturbing. Executive director Pat Rose pointed out that the plan sets a goal of limiting the loss of manatees to less than 30 percent of the current population over the next three generations. "So it's okay to lose up to 30 percent," Rose said. "That's a terrible biological goal." Instead, he said, the state's goal should be to boost the manatee population so it can be taken off the state's list of protected species. But the plan notes that would require the manatee population to grow from about 3,000 now to 10,000, "perhaps an unlikely population level." Earlier this year, state wildlife commissioners voted to reclassify manatees from "endangered" to "threatened." But first, officials have to put together a plan for managing the species. They will take public comments on the plan until Jan. 11. Commissioners will vote on it in the spring.
[Last modified November 10, 2006, 00:44:32]
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