Coyotes are well-established across Brevard County, and residents from beachside neighborhoods to inland subdivisions are reporting them with increasing frequency, including during daylight hours.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has documented coyotes in all 67 Florida counties since at least 2007, and the agency considers the species naturalized. FWC does not maintain an official population count, but reported encounters have climbed steadily over the past decade, particularly during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The problem is not just in Brevard County or even Florida. Coyotes are spreading rapidly and have greatly expanded their range over the past several decades. They’ve spread into new territories in North America by 40 percent since the 1950s, twice the rate of any other North American carnivore, and now live in every U.S. state but Hawaii. A 2018 Hody-Kays study documented continent-wide spread and found that the geographic distribution of coyotes has dramatically expanded since 1900, spreading across much of the continent during a period when most other mammal species have been declining.

Indian Harbour Beach officials raised alarms several years ago about coyotes at Gleason Park that had stopped fleeing humans, an early signal of the habituation pattern wildlife biologists warn about.

“They used to see humans and run back into the woods.”

Indian Harbour Beach Police Chief David Butler, as told to WFTV Channel 9

Behavioral shifts like that are typically tied to coyotes finding food sources around people, including pet food left outside, unsecured trash, fallen fruit and, in some cases, food provided intentionally by residents. Once coyotes lose their wariness, they are more likely to be seen during the day and more likely to approach pets. To them, there is little reason to be frightened.

FWC cautions that more sightings do not necessarily mean more coyotes. Habituated animals are simply more visible.

For Brevard residents, the practical guidance from FWC is straightforward: keep cats indoors, walk small dogs on short non-retractable leashes, secure trash and pet food, pick up fallen fruit and never feed coyotes. If a coyote approaches, the recommended response is hazing: yelling, waving arms and throwing small objects toward but not at the animal.

Unprovoked attacks on humans remain rare in Florida, though there have been recent high-profile incidents elsewhere in the state, including a series of attacks in Atlantic Beach in spring 2025 that ended with the responsible animal being shot by police.

Pets Are At Risk

Pet predation in Brevard is well documented. Among the cases reported by local and national outlets in recent years:

In 2018, a family driving past Suntree Country Club in Melbourne lost a newly adopted rescue dog when it jumped from an open vehicle window. The dog’s remains were later recovered on the club’s golf course, and staff and a wildlife trapper attributed the kill to a pack of five coyotes that had been seen on the property for weeks, according to reporting by Florida Today and other outlets.

That same year, Indialantic resident Gillian Dionne lost a cat named Mia to a coyote and watched on a home security camera as a second cat was chased off her front porch, Fox 35 Orlando reported at the time. The second cat survived by climbing a tree.

In 2019, residents of Windover Farms in Melbourne reported repeated sightings of red-coated coyotes and several missing or killed cats. Resident Neal Stein told Spectrum News 13 that his cat, Daisy, had been killed near his driveway by a coyote.

Wildlife trapper James Dean, who has set traps in response to several Brevard incidents, has repeatedly pointed to one root cause: people feeding wildlife, deliberately or accidentally. “Feeding wild animals is the same as signing their death warrant,” he told reporters from the Associated Press.

Coyote Effects On Local Ecologies Is Complex

The ecological story is more nuanced. Researchers with the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences have argued that coyotes contribute meaningfully to Florida’s ecosystems by controlling populations of rodents, white-tailed deer and mid-sized predators such as raccoons, opossums and foxes, species that, left unchecked, can become overabundant.

Some biologists believe coyotes are partially filling the ecological role left vacant when red wolves, Florida’s native large canid, were extirpated by the 1920s. Red wolves have been reintroduced in northeastern North Carolina, to mixed success, but not yet in Florida. In the Tar Heel state, only 27-28 known red wolves remain, and they are a critically endangered species. Florida, with its far denser population, may not be a suitable place for reintroduction, something the coyote is all too happy to take advantage of.

Sea Turtles May Be At Risk

The picture grows more complicated on Brevard’s beaches.

Coyotes have become a documented predator of those nests in parts of Florida. A federal environmental assessment cited by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service identified coyotes as one of the most efficient nest predators on northwest Florida beaches, alongside long-established threats such as raccoons, armadillos, and feral hogs. Peer-reviewed research has examined fencing and screening strategies in response to rising coyote pressure on loggerhead nests.

The county hosts the densest sea turtle nesting in the United States. Brevard’s coast contains the Archie Carr National Wildlife Refuge near Melbourne Beach, which alone accounts for roughly a quarter of all loggerhead nests and about a third of all green sea turtle nests laid in the country, according to The Conservation Fund. In 2020, more than 39,000 sea turtle nests were laid in Brevard County, the Sea Turtle Preservation Society reported.

Brevard’s turtle patrol volunteers already place wire screens over at-risk nests, primarily to deter raccoons, long the dominant nest predator on the Space Coast. As coyote presence on the barrier island grows, conservationists are watching closely to see whether nest protection strategies need to expand.

Report unusual coyote activity