Warnings are going out to parents about a deadly amoeba that may be lurking below the surface of local rivers and lakes.
The risk is usually at its peak in the hottest months like July, but recent warm temperatures are causing some concern.
PDF: What you need to know about the amoeba
Miguel Moreno, 9, and his brother Elier, 7, love spending time with their parents on Lake Conway.
Their mother said they have strict rules when it comes to jumping in the water.
"Always plug your nose," Miguel said.
"So you don't get no germs in your nose," Elier said.
That's the recommended way to protect children against an infectious warm water amoeba, found in warm lakes, rivers, and hot springs in central Florida and around the world.
Naegleria fowleri enters the body through the nose, and then travels into the brain causing a deadly disease. It is sometimes referred to as the "brain-eating amoeba" or "brain-eating ameba."
After a Seminole County elementary school student contracted the infection last year and died following a trip to Costa Rica, his parents started a foundation in his honor and to educate others
Boys contract Naegleria fowleri more often than girls, though it is not known why. But girls are far from in the clear.
Channel 9 reported on Brevard County parents who lost their daughter to this same destructive illness after swimming in the St. Johns River in 2011.
"If we could save other people's lives and they don't have to go through what I went through, I think this would just be a blessing in disguise," the girl's mother, P.J. Nash Ryder said in a 2011 interview.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, of the 133 people known to have been infected in the United States only three have survived.
The infection cannot be spread from one person to another and the amoeba is not found in salt water.