TV show comes to Citrus to spotlight manatees

HOMOSASSA — Wildlife biologist and Emmy-award winning television host Jeff Corwin has chosen the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park as a location to film a few episodes of his new show, “Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin.”

Cathy Kapulka

Jeff Corwin, bottom left, works with Dr. Ray Ball, center, a veterinarian and director of medical sciences for the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa, as he draws a blood sample from C.C. Baby, a rescued manatee at Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park as Ken Torres, right, park service specialist, holds the manatee. Patrick Greene, top left, director of photography and cameraman for the show “Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin,” records the process as Mark Lowe, background, a retired veterinarian from the park, looks on. The show airs Saturday mornings on ABC.

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Cathy Kapulka

Wildlife biologist Jeff Corwin, center, talks with biologists and Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park staff as he films a segment for his new show, Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin.

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The show, which is slated for 26 episodes, airs Saturday mornings and is broadcast nationally on more than 200 ABC affiliates.
Corwin’s half-hour show is based at the Georgia Aquarium, the largest in the world, but he ventures across the globe to bring wildlife into the living rooms of people in 120 different countries.
“I had an infectious passion for nature and wildlife,” Corwin said as he talked about the start of his television career. “I combined my interests of being in the field, studying and being a biologist and found something to be able to share that information with children.”
He is well known for his first series, “Going Wild With Jeff Corwin,” a Disney nature show produced in the late 1990s, and “The Jeff Corwin Experience,” which first aired on the Animal Planet cable channel in 2001.
At the Homosassa Park, Corwin said he originally intended to feature two of its manatees in an upcoming episode but got a bonus when he found out the park was ready to release a black bear that was in its care after its mother was hit and killed by a vehicle in Umatilla. He also plans on incorporating the park’s whooping cranes in another show.
At the park he focused on two cold-stressed manatees that were rescued after a frigid Florida winter almost caused their demise: C.C. Baby form Cape Coral and Krystal from Crystal River.
He worked with Dr. Ray Ball, a veterinarian and director of medical sciences for the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa; Dr. Mark Lowe, a retired veterinarian from the park and biologists from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS).
They performed ultrasound tests, took blood samples, measured and weighed the manatees. The results were recorded and will be reviewed by the veterinarians and the organizations to determine when to release both manatees back into the wild.
Corwin’s team recorded the whole process as he narrated the procedures.
The show’s director, Jude Gerard Prest, said he could not give an exact date on when the show on manatees is scheduled to air, but he estimated sometime in January or February 2012.
Chronicle reporter Cathy Kapulka can be reached at (352) 564-2922 or ckapulka@chronicleonline.com.