Coyote attacks on humans are rare but not unheard of. Between 1970 and 2015, researchers documented 367 attacks across the United States and Canada, with only two resulting in death. That works out to roughly eight attacks per year across an entire continent where millions of people live alongside coyotes. Your chances of being attacked are extremely low, but understanding when and why coyotes become aggressive can help you stay safe.
How Often Coyotes Attack People
The 367 documented attacks over 45 years give important context: coyotes are far less dangerous than dogs, bees, or even deer (which cause fatalities through vehicle collisions). The two fatal attacks involved a 3-year-old girl in Glendale, California, in 1981 and a 19-year-old woman hiking alone in Cape Breton Highlands National Park, Nova Scotia, in 2009. Both cases were exceptional and involved unusual circumstances.
When researchers classified the motivation behind 142 attack incidents, the breakdown looked like this:
- Predatory behavior: 37% of attacks, where the coyote treated a person (often a small child) as potential prey
- Investigative behavior: 22%, where coyotes approached out of curiosity and the encounter escalated
- Rabies: 7%, where the animal was confirmed rabid
- Pet-related: 6%, where a coyote went after a person’s dog and the owner got involved
- Defensive: 4%, where a coyote felt cornered or was protecting pups
The predatory category is the most concerning, and it disproportionately involves young children who are outdoors unsupervised. Adults are rarely targeted as prey.
Why Some Coyotes Lose Their Fear of People
The single biggest driver of conflict is habituation, the gradual process by which a coyote stops seeing humans as a threat. This typically happens when people feed coyotes (intentionally or not) or when coyotes find easy meals in garbage, pet food left outside, or compost bins. Over time, they associate humans with food rather than danger.
That said, food isn’t always the explanation. Research from Cape Breton Highlands National Park, where the 2009 fatal attack occurred, found that only one of seven coyotes involved in attacks on people had been eating human food beforehand. In that case, the coyotes were in poor physical condition and lacked natural prey. Severe environmental conditions, like scarce food in a harsh landscape, created a different pathway to aggression. When coyotes are hungry enough, they can become bold even without prior exposure to human food sources.
Urban Coyotes Are Bolder Than Rural Ones
Coyotes living in cities behave measurably differently around people than their rural counterparts. In a study comparing flight responses, 80% of rural coyotes showed the strongest possible fear reaction when a person approached: they fled immediately without looking back. Urban coyotes told a different story. Nearly half (46%) showed minimal flight responses, sometimes moving only slowly, stopping to look back, or barely retreating at all, occasionally staying within 10 feet of where they started.
This doesn’t mean urban coyotes are about to attack. It means they’ve learned that people in parks and neighborhoods generally ignore them, so they’ve adjusted their comfort zone. But reduced fear is the first step on the escalation ladder. A coyote that doesn’t run from you today may approach you tomorrow, and one that approaches may eventually nip or bite, especially if it has been finding food near people.
Seasons When Risk Increases
Coyotes become more territorial and aggressive between late February and June. Breeding season runs from roughly February through March, and the heightened defensiveness continues through denning season and into spring while adults are raising pups. During this window, coyotes are more likely to confront dogs they see as competitors or threats to their young, and occasionally redirect that aggression toward the dog’s owner.
If you walk your dog in areas where coyotes are active, keeping your dog on a leash during these months significantly reduces the chance of a confrontation. Off-leash dogs can wander near a den site without you realizing it, triggering a defensive response from a parent coyote that might otherwise have avoided you entirely.
Who Is Most at Risk
Small children are the most vulnerable group. The predatory attacks in the research data overwhelmingly involved young kids, particularly toddlers playing in yards in areas where coyotes had become habituated. An adult coyote typically weighs 25 to 40 pounds, which isn’t large enough to pose a serious predatory threat to most adults but can injure a small child. If you live in an area with active coyotes, supervising young children during outdoor play is the most important precaution you can take.
Adults who are attacked typically sustain minor injuries: bites to the legs or hands. Serious maulings of adults are vanishingly rare. The 2009 fatality in Nova Scotia involved multiple coyotes and is considered an anomaly by wildlife researchers.
What to Do if a Coyote Approaches You
The recommended response is called hazing, and it works because coyotes are fundamentally cautious animals that can be retrained to fear people. The key principles: never ignore a coyote that’s approaching, never turn your back on one, and make yourself as loud and large as possible.
Effective hazing techniques include:
- Sound: Yelling, clapping, air horns, whistles, shaking a can filled with coins or pebbles
- Projectiles: Throwing small rocks, tennis balls, sticks, or cans toward (not necessarily at) the coyote
- Visual deterrents: Opening an umbrella suddenly, waving your arms, standing tall
- Sprays: A garden hose, water gun, or vinegar in a spray bottle
Varying your tools matters. Coyotes learn quickly and can become desensitized to a single type of deterrent. If you always yell, they’ll eventually tune it out. Combining noise with a thrown object or a spray of water keeps the experience unpredictable and frightening for them.
The goal isn’t to hurt the coyote. It’s to rebuild the association between humans and unpleasant experiences. Communities that practice consistent hazing, where every resident responds aggressively to bold coyotes rather than watching passively, see measurable reductions in conflicts over time.
Reducing Attractants Around Your Home
Most coyote problems start with food. Securing garbage cans with locking lids, bringing pet food and water bowls inside at night, cleaning up fallen fruit from trees, and never deliberately feeding coyotes are the baseline steps. Bird feeders can also be an indirect attractant, since they draw rodents that coyotes hunt.
If you have small pets, letting them outside unattended at dawn and dusk (when coyotes are most active) carries the highest risk. Cats and small dogs are far more likely to be targeted by coyotes than people are, and a coyote that’s been successfully hunting pets in a neighborhood is one that’s growing comfortable around homes and humans.