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PHYSICAL
Manatees weigh 400 to 550 kilograms , and average 2.8 to 3.0 metres in length, sometimes growing to 4.6 metres and 1,775 kilograms At birth, baby manatees weigh about 30 kilograms each.
The manatee has a large, flexible, prehensile upper lip, used to gather food and eat and for social interaction and communication.
Manatees have shorter snouts than dugongs. The lids of manatee's widely spaced eyes close in a circular manner. The adults have no incisor or canine teeth.
Teeth are replaced throughout life, with new teeth growing at the back and older teeth falling out. At any time, a manatee has no more than six teeth in its mouth.
Its tail is paddle-shaped, and is the clearest visible difference between manatees and dugongs; a dugong tail is fluked, similar in shape to that of a whale.
The manatee is unusual among mammals in having just six cervical vertebrae. Other mammals have seven cervical vertebrae, other than the two-toed and three-toed sloths.