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Friday the thirteenth was a good day for Gymnastic Chicken and her baby, Chicken Little.

The two endangered Florida manatees were returned to their home near Calusa Island Marina and Yacht Club in Goodland after spending six weeks at Tampa’s Lowery Park Zoo. Both were apparently hit by a boat when Chicken Little was a few days old, said Virginia Edmonds, assistant curator of Florida mammals for the zoo. They were rescued April 24.

Two women who recently moved from Indianapolis, Ind., to Marco Island had never seen manatees in the wild, so they came to witness the release Friday afternoon.

Barbara Galbraith and her adult daughter, Eliza Stamm, waited excitedly for the box truck carrying the pair to arrive.

“I don’t know what to expect,” Stamm said, adding she’d like to touch one.

“I’ve never seen one before, except on television,” the grandmotherly Galbraith said. “I’m happy they are saving them.”

Liz Carr, a Marco Island code enforcement officer, took her lunch break to watch the release.

“I want to see the mama and baby so I can take pictures to send to my grandchildren,” she said. Her grandchildren live in Indiana and West Virginia.

“They’re so gentle,” she said. “They just come up and look right at you (while boating).”

She had never seen a manatee released back into its home before.

The three women didn’t have to wait long to see the manatees released.

Right on time at 12:30 p.m., the truck carrying the manatees and an entourage of workers from the zoo and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission arrived at the marina to the delight of about 40 to 50 people — young and old — who came out to see the mammals released.

The calf, which weighed 69 pounds when he was first found floating in the bay, had grown to a whopping 120 pounds. It took only a few people to get him off the truck and put him at the landing to the boat ramp.

While he lay on the concrete ramp, volunteers and zoo workers kept him shaded by holding material over his body and intermittently poured water on him.

“I’m concerned it’s taking time,” Galbraith said. “You can tell he’s a living creature when they pour water on him and he takes a breath. They have feelings. See?” she said, pointing out while some water was poured on him.

“He also wants his mother,” Galbraith said.

Stamm was glowing like a proud mother seeing the calf for the first time.

“It’s fabulous,” she said. “He’s got a face only a mother can love. I love them. I want one.”

At one point, Chicken Little began squirming much like a small child does when made to sit through too long of a church sermon. One of the Lowery Zoo employees began patting him on his back to comfort him, as a mother would a child.

The manatees were found in the bay by some boaters who flagged down an FWC officer, said Dee Semeyn, an FWC employee.

The mother had fresh boat strike marks and the calf had a couple of marks where the props apparently bumped it while it was nursing, Edmonds said.

“She had just had that calf,” she said. “He came in with air and was buoyant.”

Concerns about the calf being unable to nurse underwater led the mammal team to the decision to recover the manatees and take them to the zoo for evaluation.

To get Gymnastic Chicken off the truck required about a dozen people and took about a half hour.

She didn’t like the 4-hour-long ride, Edmonds said.

It took time to center her on straps so people had room to lift and maneuver her. Volunteers for Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service helped with the mother.

Once she was on the ground near her calf, she attempted to roll over, prompting cries for “I need some weight over there.” Several of those who had just lifted the 1,550-pound mother from the truck immediately went to her aid, holding her so she wouldn’t roll over on her back.

Usually, people get a chance to touch the mammals before they are released into the water, Edmonds said. This time though, time was of the essence because of the mother’s behavior.

So the humans once again lifted mother and baby and walked them toward the water about 10 feet away. The manatees swam off together underwater.

And then, much to the delight of those watching the pair reunite in the water, they both lifted their heads and turned slightly as if to say thanks to the humans.

Edmonds said the calf had probably nursed shortly after being reunited with its mother. They remained in the general vicinity of the boat ramp.

“I was thrilled,” Edmonds said. “They did just what I wanted them to do.”

To report injured wildlife, call FWC’s wildlife alert hotline at (888) 404-3922.

E-mail Valli Finney at vallimfinney@yahoo.com

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Facts about two rescued manatees:

-- Gymnastic Chicken, named for a rubber-chicken looking boat prop scar on her back, is more than 30 years old.

-- During winter, she frequents the Florida Power and Light discharge area in east Fort Myers.

-- She has been known to researchers for at least 10 years.

-- She has at least 11 prop scars on her body.

-- Chicken Little has two scars on his back.

-- Calves stay with their mothers for about 18 months, learning to feed and survive.

-- Chicken Little will weigh between 300 and 400 pounds before he stops nursing at about a year old.