Sea Cow

“The saint in the sea living up to 70 years”  

One of the existing species in Herbivores Animal mostly found in Australia and calm underwater can live up to 70 years. 

   Classification 

     Kingdom –   Animalia

     Phylum –     Chordata 

     Class –        Mammalia

     Order-         Sirenia

     Family –      Dugongidae

     Genus-        Dugong

     Species-      dugon

It weighs almost 400 kg and is 3 m in length with a fluke-shaped tail and is mostly found in Australia, Southeast Asia, and western Africa. They relate to whales and dolphins up to great extent and swim at a speed of 10km/hr. They remain on the surface for 6 minutes thus taking shallower areas mostly.  They live in the ocean but at times when water is brackish in nature, they can also move to land areas. 

Now their food habit includes eating day and night with their bristles on their upper lip and grazing all day for seagrass. Their measure of intelligence is in relation to their 0.1% of body weight as they remember their feeding places very well. 

The reproductive phase starts with maturity occurs in males with the formation of tusks and even they can reproduce up to 50 years but females give birth at a lesser number in their whole life and invest more time in parental care. This will be internal fertilization and also at the juvenile stage, they can be eaten by large species in the ocean.

Dugongs are related to Elephants and have close living relations with manatees. Similarly like elephants, they try to talk by whistling and chirping. Even with weak eyesight, they have a strong sense of smell as their body responds. Their brain is also small in size as it doesn’t go hunting for prey.

Being present as abundant species on Indian shores they have been down below 200 in numbers and still there has extensive killing due to some major changes in coastal lines including quality of water and habitat disturbance. They have been listed as Vulnerable in the IUCN  Red List. The focus of the Indian government has shifted upon this issue and they also constitute a Task Force for saving these species under the Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change.