With veggie cake and jazz, River Safari manatee celebrates birthday in style
SINGAPORE — To the strains of upbeat jazz and with a vegetable cake laid on as a special treat, Canola the Singaporean manatee celebrated her third birthday in style Wednesday (July 26).
Aquarists deliver a "cake" for Canola, a Singapore-born manatee, to celebrate its third birthday at the River Safari in Singapore on July 26, 2017. Canola, weighing over 30 kilograms at birth, celebrated its third birthday 10 times heavier weighing around 300 kilogrames on July 26. Photo: AFP
SINGAPORE — To the strains of upbeat jazz and with a vegetable cake laid on as a special treat, Canola the Singaporean manatee celebrated her third birthday in style Wednesday (July 26).
The nearly 300kg manatee swam around in a large aquarium as a three-piece jazz band played at a party attended by dozens of schoolchildren.
Divers swam in carrying a 2m high “cake” made of sweet potato leaves and carrot and topped off with a “C” fashioned from cabbage, as the guests sang happy birthday.
The festivities were joined by the other 12 manatees in Canola’s herd, who jostled for bites of the cake in the aquarium.
Canola is the mascot for the River Safari, a wildlife park in Singapore. She was born there but was raised by River Safari staff after being abandoned by her mother.
To emulate the fatty milk produced by nursing manatees, her carers added canola oil to the formula they fed her — which gave the sea cow her name.
The manatee is a marine mammal that has flippers, a flat tail and an egg-shaped head. It is classified as “vulnerable” by protection group the International Union for Conservation of Nature. AFP
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