Fertilizer blackout and watering rules — Brevard County, Florida

Throughout Brevard County, from Titusville to Palm Bay, applying fertilizer that contains nitrogen or phosphorus is banned from June 1 to September 30, the rainy season ban the City of Palm Bay describes as countywide (City of Palm Bay).

The reason is the summer weather pattern. Palm Bay Public Works explains that afternoon thundershowers in those four months can wash fertilizer off lawns into stormwater systems or groundwater, which carry it to lakes, streams, rivers or the Indian River Lagoon, where it can feed algae blooms that cloud the water and block the sunlight seagrass needs (Palm Bay stormwater program). The 2026 ban ended September 30, and the next one starts June 1, 2027.

The ban covers nutrients, not every product. Under the Palm Bay ordinance, fertilizers with no nitrogen or phosphorus can still go on established lawns during the summer, and specialty fertilizer can still go on gardens and flowers (City of Palm Bay). The city's label lesson: a first number of zero means no nitrogen, a middle number of zero means no phosphorus, and a bag marked 0-0-27 may be used in the summer rainy season everywhere except buffer zones.

The Town of Melbourne Beach said the same. The town, in a 2023 version of its sustainability page, described the Brevard County summer fertilizer ban as running June 1 through September 30 and tied it to nutrients washing through storm drains into the Indian River Lagoon (Town of Melbourne Beach).

Outside the summer ban, Palm Bay Ordinance 2014-16 still bars phosphorus without a soil test showing a deficiency and requires that at least half of any nitrogen be slow-release (City of Palm Bay).

The city says slow-release nitrogen is better for a Palm Bay lawn and much less likely to be washed away by heavy rain or irrigation (Palm Bay Public Works). The ordinance also bans fertilizing on days when heavy rain is expected, on saturated ground, and during a flood watch or a tropical storm or hurricane watch or warning. The city's stated concern is rain washing fertilizer off Palm Bay lawns into stormwater systems that reach the Indian River Lagoon.

Clippings count too. The Palm Bay ordinance prohibits depositing grass clippings or fertilizer on any impervious surface, meaning concrete, asphalt and water bodies, because decaying clippings leach nitrogen and phosphorus (City of Palm Bay). The Town of Melbourne Beach page, as archived in 2023, called blowing grass clippings into streets or stormwater drains in the town illegal year-round (Town of Melbourne Beach, 2023).

Professional lawn crews working in Palm Bay must hold Green Industry Best Management Practice certification, which the city says Florida law requires of lawn fertilizer caretakers, and the ordinance gives two warnings before any fine is imposed (City of Palm Bay). For help choosing or applying fertilizer, Palm Bay refers residents to the Brevard County UF/IFAS Extension Office at (321) 633-1702.

Palm Bay's ordinance sets a fertilizer free zone of at least 10 feet from every body of water, with no exceptions, covering ponds, canals, ditches, creeks and rivers (City of Palm Bay).

The zero-nutrient exception does not reach the buffer: the City of Palm Bay says even a 0-0-27 product is off limits inside buffer zones during the summer (Palm Bay stormwater program). The ordinance adds a voluntary low maintenance zone within 10 feet of all water bodies, where the city recommends letting vegetation that needs no fertilizer grow.

Palm Bay's page also stresses that the concern is not only waterfront lawns: every lawn can pollute nearby waters, and stormwater collected in the streets flows through catch basins and storm drains untreated to Palm Bay waterways, most of which reach the Indian River Lagoon through Turkey Creek or by direct discharge (City of Palm Bay). The same page asks residents to rake leaves and debris from the gutter in front of each home so catch basins do not clog and flood.

Brevard County follows the St. Johns River Water Management District schedule for areas not in a water shortage: until November 1, 2026, odd-numbered or unnumbered homes water Wednesday and Saturday, even-numbered homes Thursday and Sunday, and nonresidential properties Tuesday and Friday (SJRWMD).

Daylight saving time runs from the second Sunday in March until the first Sunday in November, and during Eastern Standard Time Brevard residential watering drops to one day: Saturday for odd or no addresses, Sunday for even addresses, and Tuesday for nonresidential properties (St. Johns River Water Management District). An odd address ends in 1, 3, 5, 7 or 9. In every season, lawns may not be watered between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., and no zone may run more than one hour.

The rules cover private wells and pumps, ground water and surface water, and water from public and private utilities, with some exceptions (SJRWMD). Florida law adds a hardware rule: a person who buys and puts in an automatic sprinkler system must properly install, maintain and operate technology that interrupts it during periods of sufficient moisture, and a licensed contractor who installs or works on such a system in Brevard must test each of those devices (Florida Statutes 373.62).

Brevard is outside the current water shortage order. The district's Order 2026-017 of May 11, 2026, a Phase III Extreme Water Shortage order, which limits irrigation to one day a week and bans watering between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m., names Alachua, Baker, Bradford, Clay, Duval, Flagler, Lake, Marion, Nassau, Putnam and St. Johns counties and not Brevard (SJRWMD Order 2026-017).

The St. Johns River Water Management District lists Brevard County Code Enforcement, at 321-633-2086, among the local governments with ordinances implementing its watering restrictions, with separate city contacts such as Melbourne Code Enforcement (SJRWMD).

The district's list of local governments with ordinances implementing the watering restrictions also names Cocoa, Rockledge, Satellite Beach, Indian Harbour Beach and Cape Canaveral, and gives Melbourne Code Enforcement's number as 321 608-7905 (SJRWMD local ordinances list). Palm Bay does not appear on that list; the contact block on the City of Palm Bay stormwater page gives 120 Malabar Road and (321) 952-3400 (City of Palm Bay).

State law sits behind the local fertilizer rules. Under Florida Statutes 403.9337, a county or city located in the watershed of a nutrient-impaired water body or segment, as listed under section 403.067, must adopt the Department of Environmental Protection model fertilizer ordinance as a floor, and may set stricter standards only after showing through a science-based program that they are needed and documenting the scientific input it considered (Florida Statutes 403.9337). Palm Bay's stormwater page notes that Florida's Watershed Restoration Framework carries out provisions of the Florida Watershed Restoration Act, section 403.067 (City of Palm Bay).

Last verified: October 12, 2026, on the City of Palm Bay and St. Johns River Water Management District websites.