Boat strikes injure and kill large numbers of Florida manatees ( Trichechus manatus latirostris ) each year. Management actions taken to mitigate this threat can be potentially enhanced by consideration of manatee cognitive processes. The role of cognition in marine mammal conservation has received little consideration in the literature. Here, we integrate discoveries from laboratory research on auditory sensory processes and...

Cognition is an animal's real‐time adaptation system for responding to change. Rapid environmental change, often anthropogenic, is expanding the range and severity of challenges confronting wild animals. Effective conservation requires a multifaceted approach that includes animals' capacities. Large‐brained, long‐lived animals such as marine mammals often have extensive capability to adaptively modify their behavior due to the...

Two male Florida manatees ( Trichechus manatus latirostris ) demonstrated sensitive tactile discrimination in a two‐alternative forced choice task, using a modified staircase method. Stimuli were acrylic plates with vertical gratings of ridges and grooves. The standard stimulus, present on every trial, had 2 mm gratings and the comparison stimuli had wider gratings. The blindfolded subjects were trained to demonstrate discrimi...