Since childhood, Jamal Galves has had a passion for conserving wildlife. From the age of 12, Galves knew he wanted to work with animals — specifically, manatees.

In 1998, Glaves met Wildlife Trust scientist James “Buddy” Powell and USGS scientist Robert Bonde while participating in his first manatee capture. Working with these two renowned scientists influenced Galves enormously – he was immediately hooked, and soon found himself taking every opportunity to work with manatees. While most of his high school classmates were spending their weekends and holidays relaxing, Galves was working with scientists, monitoring and feeding two manatees who were in their final stages of rehabilitation, and eventually helping with their release and subsequent tracking.

After finishing high school, Galves volunteered to work with Belize program manager, Nicole Auil. Eventually, Galves was given a full time position with the manatee project, fulfilling his dream of protecting wildlife. Galves’ current projects include capturing, tagging and tracking manatees, collecting data and monitoring rehabilitation.  He also manages the stranding database and the necropsies of the animals. Galves will be starting school in August and working towards a degree in Marine Biology.