ORLANDO, FLA. (WSVN) - Two manatees are on the road to recovery at a Florida facility, and it’s all thanks to the team effort of some good Samaritans.

The sea cows were rescued after being found in distress in two separate incidents.

According to officials, one of the manatees was a calf that was found alone and stranded in Central Florida, while the other was rescued after it was injured in North Carolina.

It was a team effort to save one of the manatee’s life.

“If it gets out into the deep water, the dark water, we’re risking a chance of losing this animal for good,” said Brant Gabriel, curator of rescue operations SeaWorld Orlando.

The 855-pound, 9-foot-long manatees was injured by a boat propeller and was rescued on Monday from a drainage canal in North Carolina as temperatures turned cold.

“Right now, that animal is, I would say it’s pretty critical right now,” Gabriel said. “It did, I’ll tell you this, on a good note, it did start to eat a little bit but it’s getting tube-fed right now for dehydration, it’s also receiving some medication.”

That same day in Brevard County, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission rescued a manatee calf that was separated from its mother that was trapped in an area it was likely washed into by Hurricane Helene or Milton.

“Probably was still nursing off of mom, also still learning migration patterns, where to go to the feeding grounds,” Gabriel said. “These are factors without a mom there to show them that many times it can be detrimental if they don’t learn basic life skills for survival out there.”

The new additions make 52 rescued manatees that SeaWorld said they’ve taken in this year.

“All of these injuries in all these manatees for the most part that are coming in are created by humans,” he said. “These are problems that we created and we’re here to help these manatees and help the survival of this species.”

SeaWorld is caring for 30 manatees. Their goal is to return them to the wild.

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