Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) statistics span agency funding, wildlife management, boating safety, habitat protection and research. The figures below cover several different reporting periods: statewide boating and alligator results are from 2024, manatee funding is from fiscal year 2024–2025, and the performance measures include both the FY 2024–25 and FY 2015–16 Long-Range Program Plans (LRPP). Keeping those dates separate is important when comparing the scale and purpose of each measure.
Contents
- FWC budget and trust-fund mix
- 2024 statewide alligator harvest
- Alligator programs compared
- Florida boating activity and accidents
- Where boating accidents occurred
- Manatee conservation funding
- Performance measures for wildlife and fisheries
FWC budget and trust-fund mix
The FWC Budget page reports a total budget of $117,248,130. That total is distributed across several sources, with General Revenue supplying the largest listed share at 39%. The Marine Resources Conservation Trust Fund accounts for 27%, while the Federal Grants Trust Fund contributes 14%.
The remaining listed sources are the Grants and Donations Trust Fund at 9%, the State Game Trust Fund at 5%, the Nongame Wildlife Trust Fund at 3%, and the Save the Manatee Trust Fund at 2%. Together, these percentages describe a funding structure that combines general state support, federal grants, donations and purpose-specific trust funds.
The FWC Budget page’s reported shares are useful as a composition snapshot, but they should be read as source-reported percentages rather than as a recalculated dollar allocation. The figures also show why a single “FWC budget” number does not explain the agency’s work by itself: marine resources, game management, nongame wildlife, manatee conservation and grant-supported activity are represented by different funding streams.
2024 statewide alligator harvest
The Alligator Harvest Summary for 2024 reports 14,712 statewide CITES tags and 7,983 harvested alligators. The same summary says 54.3% of statewide CITES tags were used. These are program measures for the 2024 statewide harvest and should not be interpreted as a population estimate.
The reported harvest included 804 female alligators and 3,703 male alligators. Sex was unknown for 3,476 harvested alligators. Because the sex categories do not account for every harvested animal in the supplied figures, they are best presented as reported categories rather than used to infer an unreported remainder or a statewide sex ratio.
Harvested alligators ranged from 2.8 to 13.7 feet, and the average statewide size was 8.5 feet. The range gives the smallest and largest reported animals, while the average provides a single summary of the harvested group. Neither measure describes every alligator in Florida or establishes a trend beyond the 2024 reporting period.
The 2024 statewide figures also include the Super Hunt, Private Lands and Nuisance Alligator programs. Those programs have very different tag-use patterns. The Super Hunt allocated 200 CITES tags and harvested 141 alligators, with 70.5% of tags used. The Private Lands program issued 7,673 CITES tags and harvested 1,743 alligators, with 22.7% of tags used. The Nuisance Alligator program issued 8,827 CITES tags and harvested 8,752 alligators, with 99.2% of tags used.
Alligator programs compared
The program-level figures make the contrast between the 2024 harvest pathways especially clear. Nuisance Alligator had the largest reported harvest and the highest tag-use percentage. Private Lands issued almost as many tags as Nuisance Alligator but reported a much smaller harvest and lower tag use. Super Hunt operated at a far smaller allocation.
| 2024 program | CITES tags | Harvested alligators | Reported tag use |
|---|---|---|---|
| Super Hunt | 200 | 141 | 70.5% |
| Private Lands | 7,673 | 1,743 | 22.7% |
| Nuisance Alligator | 8,827 | 8,752 | 99.2% |
Source: Alligator Harvest Summary for 2024.
These percentages are not interchangeable measures of hunting success across programs. The programs serve different purposes and have different allocations, so the table is most useful for describing reported program activity. It does show that the Nuisance Alligator program accounted for the largest number of harvested animals among the three named programs, while Super Hunt had the smallest allocation and harvest.
The statewide summary reports 7,983 harvested alligators, while the three program figures above are presented as separate program statistics in the same source. They should not be added together without a documented accounting rule, because the supplied information does not establish whether the program categories are mutually exclusive components of the statewide total.
Florida boating activity and accidents
The 2024 Boating Accident Statistical Report records 1,030,053 registered vessels in Florida and 685 reportable boating accidents. It also records 76 fatal boating accidents and 81 boating fatalities. A reportable boating accident can involve at least $2,000 in aggregate property damage, according to the report’s definition supplied here.
Collision with a fixed object was the leading accident type in 2024, with 209 cases. Those collisions represented 31% of reportable boating accidents. This is the clearest single accident-type statistic in the supplied report and places fixed-object collisions within the context of all 685 reportable accidents.
The report also identifies activity involving specific vessel or recreation types. Towed watersports were involved in 7 accidents and produced 8 injuries. Paddle or human-powered craft were involved in 10 accidents and produced 9 fatalities. These figures are event-associated counts; they do not establish that the activity or craft type was the sole cause of an accident.
May was the peak boating-accident month in 2024, with 104 accidents. The monthly peak is a timing measure for reportable accidents, not a year-round average. It can help readers understand when the largest monthly count occurred, but the supplied figures do not provide all twelve monthly totals or a seasonal rate.
In 2024, Florida’s boating safety education law applied to operators born on or after January 1, 1988, when operating motorized vessels of 10 horsepower or greater. This legal applicability detail is included in the 2024 Boating Accident Statistical Report and is distinct from the accident counts themselves.
Where boating accidents occurred
Miami-Dade County recorded 75 boating accidents in 2024, including 8 boating fatalities and 41 boating injuries. Those county figures provide a geographic example within the statewide total of 685 reportable accidents, 76 fatal accidents and 81 fatalities.
The Miami-Dade counts should not be treated as a statewide ranking because the supplied statistics identify only that county. They also use different outcome measures: accidents count reported events, fatalities count deaths, and injuries count reported injuries. A county’s accident count therefore cannot be compared directly with its fatality or injury count as though they measured the same thing.
The distinction between fatal accidents and fatalities is also important. The statewide report lists 76 fatal boating accidents but 81 boating fatalities, indicating that the number of deaths is not identical to the number of fatal accident events. Miami-Dade’s supplied figures likewise list 75 accidents, 8 fatalities and 41 injuries, without stating how many of its accidents were fatal.
Taken together, the 2024 boating figures describe both exposure and outcomes: more than one million registered vessels, hundreds of reportable accidents, dozens of fatal accidents, and specific concentrations by accident type, month and county. They are safety-report measures for 2024, not a forecast of future boating risk.
Manatee conservation funding
FWC’s Annual Reports report $4,322,806 in Save the Manatee Trust Fund revenues for FY 2024–2025. The same annual-report material lists $3,796,468 in manatee operating program appropriations for that fiscal year. Revenue and appropriations are different budget measures, so the two amounts should not be presented as though one were the remaining balance after the other.
The FY 2024–2025 spending figures identify several parts of the manatee program. FWC’s Division of Habitat and Species Conservation expended $1,249,270 on manatee conservation activities. FWC’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute expended $2,456,845 on manatee research and monitoring. Mote Marine Laboratory received $313,310 for manatee research activities.
These amounts show a division between direct conservation activity, research and monitoring, and research performed by an external laboratory recipient. The supplied annual-report figures do not establish that the three expenditure or recipient amounts represent the entire program, nor do they provide a total that should be reconstructed by adding them.
The fiscal-year label matters here. FY 2024–2025 is an accounting period, while the alligator and boating figures above are calendar-year 2024 measures. They describe different windows and different agency functions.
Performance measures for wildlife and fisheries
The FY 2024–25 LRPP reports that 48.7% of wildlife species were increasing or stable. It reports a higher figure for marine fishery stocks: 80% were increasing or stable. These are performance measures for the LRPP period and should not be read as counts of species or stocks.
The same FY 2024–25 LRPP sets public contacts by law enforcement at 1,098,789. It also says 100% of research projects provide management recommendations or support management decisions. Another target places critical habitat secured and preserved at 44%. These measures cover public contact, research usefulness and habitat protection, so their percentages and counts are not directly comparable.
Earlier performance figures come from the FY 2015–16 LRPP and should remain clearly separated from the FY 2024–25 measures. The FY 2015–16 report shows 2,171,497 people reached with conservation messages, 1,589,701 fisheries assessments and data summaries conducted, and 318,305 requests for endangered and threatened species status handled.
That earlier LRPP also shows 346,758 red tide and aquatic health assessments completed, 80,733 habitat assessment requests completed, and 98 manatees rehabilitated. It reports 5,206,372 freshwater fish stocked, 87 marine fishery management plans reviewed and analyzed, and 278,718 marine fisheries service contacts.
The two LRPP periods offer a record of different reported measures, but the supplied information does not support a trend calculation between them. Some measures changed in definition, scope or reporting context, and the figures are not paired as like-for-like annual observations. The safest use is to cite each number with its own LRPP period and source label.