Manatees look like quiet animals. They drift slowly, breathe softly at the surface and rarely seem to react to anything in a hurry. But put a hydrophone, an underwater microphone, in the water near a group of manatees and you’ll hear a surprisingly busy conversation of chirps, squeaks and squeals. Manatee sounds are simple compared to the songs of humpback whales or the clicks and whistles of dolphins, but they play an important role in manatee life, above all in keeping mothers and calves together. This guide explains what manatee sounds are like, how and why manatees make them, how well manatees hear and the other ways they communicate.

What manatee sounds are like

Chirps, squeaks and squeals.

Researchers describe manatee vocalizations as chirps, squeaks, whistles and squeals. They are short, often a fraction of a second long, and fairly high-pitched, comfortably within the range people can hear. To human ears they can sound a bit like a squeaky door, a rubber toy or a small bird. Many calls have a tonal quality with harmonics, and they often rise and fall in pitch. Manatees can vary the length, loudness and pitch of their calls, and calls made in excitement or distress tend to be louder, longer and harsher.

Unlike whales, manatees don’t produce long, structured songs, and unlike dolphins, they don’t echolocate. They have no need to find prey by sound, since they eat plants, and in shallow water they can rely on touch and sight to find their way. Their vocal repertoire is built for one main job: staying in touch.

Because manatees vocalize underwater and their calls don’t carry well into the air, people watching from a boardwalk or a boat rarely hear them. Snorkelers in quiet water sometimes do, especially near mothers and calves.

Mother and calf: the main conversation

“Where are you?” “Over here.”

The most important use of manatee sounds is communication between a mother and her calf. Calves stay with their mothers for one to two years, and in the murky water where many manatees live, they can easily lose sight of each other. Mothers and calves call back and forth frequently, especially when they are separated, when one starts to move off, or when something startles them. A calf that loses its mother may call repeatedly until she responds and comes back.

Studies of manatee calls suggest that individuals have distinctive voices, with differences in pitch and call structure that may allow mothers and calves to recognize each other. That would make sense for an animal that often lives in water where you can’t see more than a few feet. Our page on baby manatees describes how close that mother-calf bond is, and our page on the manatee life cycle explains why the calf years are so important.

Other times manatees call

Excitement, stress and social moments.

Adults vocalize too, although usually less often than mothers and calves. Manatees tend to call more when they are socializing, when they are in mating herds, when they are startled, and when they are in stressful situations such as being captured for health checks or rescue. In a mating herd, where many males pursue a single female, the water can be full of squeals and chirps as the animals jostle; our page on manatee mating describes those herds.

Manatees may also call when they meet each other, during play, or when a group is moving. Researchers are still working out how much information these calls carry, but the pattern is clear: manatee sounds are mostly about contact, arousal and emotion, rather than detailed messages.

Rehabilitation centers offer a useful window into this. Orphaned calves raised by people often call frequently, especially when they are hungry or separated from companions, and staff learn to recognize individual animals partly by their voices. Older manatees in the same pools tend to be quieter, calling mainly during feeding, handling or social interaction. Observations like these, combined with recordings in the wild, support the idea that manatee calls work like a simple contact system: a way of saying “I’m here” and “where are you?” that becomes more urgent when an animal is anxious. Even that basic system is valuable for a social bond as important as the one between a mother and calf.

How manatees make sounds

A voice box, not a blowhole.

Dolphins make most of their sounds in their nasal passages, below the blowhole. Manatees are different. Their calls are thought to be produced in the larynx, the voice box, as in land mammals, a reminder of their land-mammal ancestry, which we explore on our page about manatee evolution. Anatomical studies have found structures in the manatee larynx that resemble vocal folds. Manatees can produce sounds without releasing air, so you won’t see bubbles when they call.

Sound or signal	Description	When it’s used
Chirp	Short, high, tonal call	Routine contact, especially mother and calf
Squeak / whistle	Tonal call that rises or falls in pitch	Contact, social interaction
Squeal	Louder, harsher, longer call	Excitement, stress, mating herds
Touch / nuzzling	Muzzle-to-muzzle contact, body rubbing	Greeting, bonding, social contact
Possible scent marking	Rubbing on logs, rocks or pilings	Thought to leave chemical signals

How well do manatees hear?

Good ears for high sounds.

Manatees have no external ears, only tiny openings behind the eyes, but their inner ear bones are large and their hearing is good. Studies with trained manatees have shown that they hear a wide range of frequencies and are most sensitive to higher-pitched sounds, the same range as their own calls. They are less sensitive to very low frequencies. Our page on manatee anatomy describes their ears and other senses.

That has an important consequence. The engines of slow-moving boats produce mostly low-frequency sound, which manatees hear less well, and in shallow water low sounds don’t travel well. Researchers have suggested that this may make it harder for manatees to detect slow-moving boats in time to avoid them, and some have studied the idea of warning devices that emit higher-frequency sounds manatees can hear more easily. It’s one more reason why speed zones and alert boaters matter, as explained on our page about manatee protection zones.

Touch and other ways manatees communicate

Nuzzles, rubs and whiskers.

Sound is only part of how manatees communicate. Touch is just as important. Manatees greet each other by touching muzzles, sometimes described as “kissing,” and they often rest in body contact, nuzzle, rub and embrace with their flippers. Mothers and calves are almost always touching. The whiskers on a manatee’s face and the fine sensory hairs on its body make it highly sensitive to touch and to water movement, helping it sense other manatees nearby even when it can’t see them.

Manatees also rub against logs, rocks, pilings and the bottom. Some researchers think this may leave chemical signals that other manatees can detect, possibly helping males find females ready to breed, though this is still being studied. Vision plays a role at close range too, but in murky water, sound and touch are more reliable.

How scientists study manatee sounds

Hydrophones, recordings and patient listening.

Scientists record manatee sounds using hydrophones placed in the water at springs, rivers and rehabilitation facilities. By recording calls while observing behavior, they can link particular sounds to particular situations, such as separation of a mother and calf. Recordings of individual manatees at rehabilitation centers have helped show that calls differ between individuals. Passive acoustic monitoring, leaving hydrophones in place to record over long periods, has also been tested as a way to detect manatees in places where they are hard to see, which could help with counting and with planning protection measures. Our page on manatee tracking covers other methods used to follow manatees.

What I’d listen for

A different way to watch manatees.

Most people experience manatees with their eyes, from a boardwalk or a kayak. If I were trying to get to know them better, I’d want to listen too. Some aquariums, rehabilitation centers and research groups have shared recordings of manatee calls, and hearing a calf’s repeated chirps and its mother’s answer gives you a completely different feel for these animals. It’s a reminder that the quiet gray shapes under the water are constantly keeping track of each other.

It also changes how I think about the water around them. In decades of keeping reef tanks, I have learned to pay attention to the parts of an environment you can’t easily see, like water chemistry and flow. For manatees, sound is one of those hidden parts of the environment. Boat noise and busy waterways may affect how easily mothers and calves stay in contact, which is another reason to keep things calm and slow in manatee areas.

Manatee sounds compared with other marine mammals

Simple calls in a noisy ocean.

Compared with other marine mammals, manatees have a modest vocal repertoire. Humpback whales sing long, complex songs; dolphins use clicks for echolocation and signature whistles that work much like names; seals and sea lions bark, roar and trill. Manatees have something simpler: a small set of chirps and squeaks used mostly for contact. Their close relatives, the dugongs, make similar chirps and whistles. That simplicity fits their life as slow, plant-eating animals with few predators and loose social groups, as explained on our page about what a group of manatees is called. For more on the species as a whole, see What Is a Manatee?