Meet Some Other Key West Residents

I thought that I'd finish by introducing you to a few of the more unusual residents of Key West.

Manatee are regular visitors to the boatyards and channels around Key West. This one is laying on its back drinking fresh water from a hose.

The manatee is a very strange creature. Otherwise known as the Sea Cow, it's a herbivore living on mangrove leaves, turtle grass and various types of algae. It spends most of its time grazing in shallow waters and at depths of 3 - 7 feet. Weighing up to 1200 lbs and with a length of around 10 feet they really are a sight to behold. An adult manatee will eat up to 9% of its body weight per day, that's around 110 lbs of vegetables each and every day....wow !!. Sadly, their numbers are in decline and this is mainly caused by humans and in particular, boaters. Many manatee are injured and killed each year after being hit by speeding boats. Signs that have been erected in areas where manatee are frequently sighted are often ignored and the result is that the slow moving manatee are hit by fast moving boats.

Cockerels, hens and their tribe of chicks wander freely around the streets of Key West.

Wild chickens have wandered the streets of Key West for over 50 years and are now one of the island's most famous tourist attractions. It is estimated that there are well over 2,000 birds roaming the streets and although the city council has tried on numerous occasions to get rid of the birds, the local residents have always resisted and the birds are still here. The worry of bird flu mean that another attempt was made to clear the birds from the streets in 2006 but that too failed.

The pelican is a sweet bird...unless he's trying to eat the bait that's intended for a tarpon !

Key West used to have literally thousands of pelicans in and around the harbor but Hurricane Wilma in October 2005 killed a huge number of them. Numbers now seem to be on the increase which is good news. I guess that I've just got to tell you the story of how "Pelican Jack" got his name. Our own Capt Jack Kelly was having pelican trouble one day whilst fishing for tarpon. One of the birds grabbed a baited hook and Jack had to grab said bird by the neck whilst he released the hook. He then "tapped" the bird's head on the side of the boat to try and tell it not to do it again. Said bird promptly became a dead bird and Capt. Jack was hauled in front of the judge to explain his actions. He was found guilty and was ordered to do community service which seemed to involve taking underprivileged kids fishing...oh what a hardship...Jack enjoyed every minute. Anyhow, when a regular group of anglers arrived from the UK the following spring for their annual Key West fishing trip they were all decked out in tee shirts and hats labeled "Pelican Jack Tour - Spring 2005".

With not a care in the world, this turtle wanders the oceans looking for jellyfish for his lunch...I'd like to be a turtle

Although not an everyday sight, it's not uncommon to see a turtle floating around out in the middle of nowhere. We came across one last year that was the size of a dinner table and it had 5 cobia swimming around it. We hooked four of them and landed two...thanks Mr Turtle.

Find a frigate bird and the fish are never far away

I was going to add a few words about the strange residents (human type) that we've come across here in Key West but I think you'd better search these out for yourself...they're not too hard to find. I'll settle for ending with the Frigate Bird. Frigate birds are a wonderful sight. They're big and they're beautiful and they will often lead you to fish. If you're offshore searching for dolphin fish or cobia or in fact any of the surface feeding fish and you see frigate birds you can be certain that the fish are very close by.