Mati the Manatee and the Quiet Canal

Page 1 — A soft morning

Before the howler monkeys started their dawn alarm, the canals of Tortuguero were quiet. The water was warm and brown, like cocoa with cream stirred in. Mati, a young manatee, drifted just under the surface where freshwater met the sea. She tipped her wide grey snout up. Pfft — a tiny breath of air, then she sank back down to the waving sea grass below.

Page 2 — Breakfast in the meadow

Mati was hungry. Manatees eat for hours every morning — up to a tenth of their whole body weight in plants. She paddled her round tail with slow, easy strokes and reached the underwater meadow. Her split upper lip moved like two soft fingers, plucking river weed and water lettuce one careful bite at a time. The current rocked her gently. She chewed.

Page 3 — A visitor with a long beak

A green kingfisher zipped over the canal, then stopped to perch on a low mangrove root. Plop — he plunged in, came up with a tiny silver fish, and shook himself dry. “Good morning,” he whistled at Mati. She blew bubbles back, which is how manatees say hello. The kingfisher tilted his head. He’d never seen a creature so big move so slowly.

Page 4 — A shadow above

Then, the sound of a boat. Putt-putt-putt. The water above Mati rippled. A dark shape slid across the sky of her world. Mati could not see well, but she could feel the bumpy pulse of the engine on her skin. Boats are not friends to manatees. Their spinning blades move too fast for slow swimmers to dodge. Mati needed to think.

Page 5 — The deepest part

Mati did what manatees have done for thousands of years. She waited for her four-minute breath to come due, took one careful gulp of air at the canal’s edge, then sank straight down into the deepest channel. Her closest living relative on land is the elephant, and like an elephant she has heavy bones that help her stay low. The boat passed above. She did not move. She just listened to her own heartbeat, slow and steady.

Page 6 — The whole canal hers again

When the sound was gone, Mati rose. The mid-morning light came down through the water in green ribbons. The kingfisher was back on his root. A scarlet macaw called from somewhere far in the trees. Tortuguero’s canals are one of the only places in Costa Rica where manatees still live, and the people who care for these waters work hard to keep it that way. Mati floated out into the meadow again. What other quiet creatures, do you think, are sharing the canal with her right now?