A new study reveals that coyote populations on the Outer Banks persist despite ongoing removal programs, posing a continued threat to shore-nesting birds and protected sea turtles. The study is the first in-depth assessment of coyote populations on barrier islands and has ramifications for understanding how coyotes may impact these and other barrier island ecosystems.
Specifically, this is the first peer-reviewed study to estimate coyote density and population size on any barrier island. Over three seasons between 2024 and 2025, researchers from North Carolina State University collected and analyzed DNA from coyote fecal samples across seven Outer Banks islands: Bodie, Pea, Hatteras, Ocracoke, North Core, South Core and Shackleford Banks.
Researchers identified 62 coyotes over the course of the study and estimated that between 45 and 60 coyotes inhabit the Outer Banks at any one time, despite removal efforts. The National Park Service removed 14 coyotes from Bodie and Hatteras islands in 2024, yet researchers continued to detect coyotes on both islands throughout the year, finding substantial turnover as new individuals replaced many of those that disappeared.
"Coyotes are here to stay on the Outer Banks," said the study's lead author Daniel Sossover, a research associate in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources at NC State University and at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences.
"The National Park Service has spent a lot of money for more than a decade trying to manage the coyotes' impact on shore-nesting birds and sea turtles through lethal removal, but the coyotes are still here," Sossover said. "I think we have to recognize that coyotes are now part of this ecosystem whether we like it or not, and we have to find a way to coexist with them."
Coyotes moved into the Outer Banks over the past two decades, presumably by crossing bridges and swimming between islands. Coyote range expansion has raised ecological and management concerns among residents, visitors and wildlife managers.
From 2009 to 2025, in an effort to reduce coyote depredation, the National Park Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lethally removed more than 170 coyotes from Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Cape Lookout National Seashore and Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge — all of which serve as nesting habitats for both shore-nesting birds and sea turtles.
Sossover, who conducted the study to inform future management and removal actions, said coyote removal often fails, in part, because of reproduction. Past research shows that when coyote populations face heavy pressure from removal, the animals often respond by breeding earlier, having larger litter sizes and even moving into removal areas. This allows local populations to bounce back rapidly.
In their study, Sossover and collaborators — including NC State University professors Roland Kays and Liz Kierepka and Nathan Hostetter of the U.S. Geological Survey — found that coyote density generally declined as islands became more isolated from the mainland. Bodie Island, which is connected to the mainland, had the highest coyote density, while North Core Banks had the lowest, followed by Ocracoke Island.
They also found four distinct genetic groups across the Outer Banks. Three were largely associated with Hatteras and Pea islands; Bodie Island; and South Core Banks and Shackleford Banks. These groups had lower genetic diversity and many closely related coyotes, suggesting they were likely founded relatively recently by a small number of animals from the mainland and are now largely made up of family groups.
"These patterns tell us the islands weren't colonized by a wave of coyotes from the mainland but by a few founders each, whose descendants now make up most of the population," Sossover said.
On Bodie and Hatteras islands, the researchers found that coyotes lived in separate groups, or packs, that stayed in different parts of the islands. Some coyotes stayed in the north while others stayed in the south, and coyotes in the same area were more closely related. The remaining islands appeared to each support a single pack that uses the entire island rather than separate groups occupying different areas.
The coyotes were not completely isolated from one another, however. The researchers found genetic connections between the mainland and coyotes on Bodie Island, North Core Banks and Ocracoke Island, suggesting that occasional immigration from the mainland may help sustain these small island groups.
Sossover said the findings ultimately highlight the "remarkable adaptability of coyotes," demonstrating how effective they are at colonizing new areas.
"A handful of founders is all it takes to establish, organize socially and persist, even on isolated islands and even under removal," Sossover said.
The findings could help wildlife managers rethink coyote management on the Outer Banks, where eradication appears unlikely to succeed. Instead, Sossover said managers may need to focus on reducing coyotes' impacts on vulnerable nesting species through behavioral deterrents and other strategies alongside, or instead of, lethal removal.
The study, " Coyote density, demography, and genetic structure across North Carolina's barrier islands ," is published in the Journal of Wildlife Management. Co-authors include Roland Kays and Elizabeth Kierepka of NC State University and Nathan Hostetter of the U.S. Geological Survey.
This work was made possible through support from the National Park Service Inventory and Monitoring Division.
