The LPGA has worked for years to make women’s golf more exciting to watch and in 2026 their efforts paid off. Every round of every tournament was broadcast live; there were 50% more cameras, three times as many microphones, and drones flew over the fairways. The tour set up equipment all over El Caballero Country Club in Tarzana. But such is the irony that the most unforgettable moment wasn’t a shot or a swing, but a “coyote” on a hunt for his lunch!

At the $4.75 million JM Eagle LA championship in Los Angeles, a coyote wandered onto the course during play and acted like it belonged there. After scanning the area for a while, he finally saw from a distance a fuzzy thing and launched towards it. He then grabbed this apparent animal by his mouth and began dragging it across the grass. “Nice lunch” the coyote must have thought. Except it was no animal. 

It was actually a broadcast microphone. When the coyote faced resistance because of the connecting cable and realized it’s not food, it let it go. But can you blame him for catching hold of the microphone? After all, the industry standard for that fuzzy windscreen is called a “dead cat”! And this moment, went viral.

The LPGA’s official account shared the 15-second video at 5:07 AM. And oddly enough, this isn’t even the first time a coyote has made itself at home on a golf course, or well, the first reminder that nature doesn’t really care about human plans.

In July 2025, a coyote at the Burlington Golf and Country Club stole a ball right off the green while golfer Jackson Cooling was about to score. He never got the ball back, but for everyone it was worth watching the animal simply having fun. In fact, he even made a social media account just to share this once-in-a-lifetime sighting. Then it happened again, and this time there were 20 mongooses! 

At the 2016 Nedbank Golf Challenge in South Africa, 20 mongooses stormed the green midway across the putting surface, calmly running together as players watched in awe.

Then back in 1998, a seagull picked up Brad Fabel’s tee shot on the par-3 17th at TPC Sawgrass, flew it over the water, and dropped it in the hazard. That meant Fabel got a free drop under Rule 18-1, but he still three-putted for bogey. The seagull, of course, wasn’t penalized. 

Cody Gribble faced a similar moment in 2017 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He walked up to an alligator lying by the fairway and tapped its tail to send it back into the water. At the Puerto Rico Open, an iguana walked right up to Andrew Loupe’s ball on the green, checked it out, and then wandered off for no clear reason.

These kinds of incidents are common. Golf happens in the middle of nature, and now cameras catch even more of it. This week’s JM Eagle LA Championship at El Caballero has 15 of the top 25 players in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings. The coyote, of course, didn’t care about any of that.

Why the JM Eagle LA Championship coyote sighting is not surprising!

El Caballero is in Tarzana, in the San Fernando Valley, where the suburbs meet the canyons and the streets come to an end. The Santa Monica Mountains start just minutes from the course’s western side, and coyotes ignore property boundaries. Wildlife experts watching the Encino-Tarzana area have seen coyotes use golf courses, parks, and empty lots to move through the city. They are most active at dawn and dusk, but in places where they are used to people, they are showing up more often during the day.

Los Angeles County has a special system for reporting coyote sightings because people here have learned to share space with these animals instead of being caught off guard by them.

What changed in 2026 was not how coyotes act, but how many cameras are watching the grass when they do. Now that every round is broadcast live and more equipment is set up throughout the course than before, there are many more chances to catch unexpected moments.

The LPGA’s broadcast setup, meant to highlight its players, ended up capturing something completely different on Sunday morning in Tarzana. The tournament went on. Somewhere near the edge of the San Fernando Valley, a fuzzy piece of broadcast equipment is still missing.