Dugongs are kind of like an adorable elephant-manatee-cow hybrid with a permanant smile. They eat sea grass all day, roll with a multispecies entourage and were once thought to be mermaids by sailors. Sadly, their populations are declining. #savethemermaids #savethedugong #dugong #seacows #okinawa #henoko | Center for Biological Diversity

27K views · 2.6K reactions | : bugDreamer.com // The dugong is one of 4 living species of the order Sirenia, along with 3 manatee species. Sirenians are the only herbivores among marine mammals. They are classified in the clade Paenungulata, alongside the elephants and the hyraxes, and evolved in the Eocene 50 million years ago. Meaning, their closest relatives are actually land-dwelling creatures rather than marine mammals! | Ocean Conservation Research - OCR | Facebook