An orphaned baby manatee
gets his last bottle as SeaWorld prepares him for eventual release into the wild.
For a final time this week, Jennifer Parnell cradled an orphaned baby manatee, now about the weight of an NFL linebacker, to feed him a lunchtime bottle.
Jose the calf was moving on — a small victory in Parnell’s career that can be often marked with loss and relentless hours.
At 240 pounds, Jose has been finally weaned off the bottle and is ready for a vegetable diet as SeaWorld Orlando prepares him to be released into the wild in the next year or so.
“It’s pretty special to be a part of that,” Parnell said.
The senior animal rescue specialist remembered when the manatee named after Hurricane Jose was 66 pounds, found beaten up in Fort Myers after Hurricane Irma last year. His mother had lost him or died. Jose was on his own.
For months, Parnell held him like a wiggling infant and fed him every three hours with a sweet-tasting formula that smelled like a piña colada, full of oil to mimic his mother’s milk. She fed him at 3 a.m. She fed him on Thanksgiving and the routine days in between. The other SeaWorld rescue team members took turns feeding him, too, when Parnell was not there.
Jose survived, hitting milestones, such as weighing 200 pounds in May. Sometimes, he took steps backward as he battled an infection or had a stomach illness.
Hundreds of bottle feedings later, Parnell laid on the rocks Tuesday afternoon while Jose and other baby manatees underwater crowded below her, like begging dogs.
Jose, confident now and bold, popped up because he knew what was next. He looked up at her, waiting.
Parnell gently held his flippers while he slurped his bottle.
Tourists gathered around, pulling out their cellphones to