Can Dolphin Help You Catch More Fish?

Many offshore anglers may not realize it, but the answer to this question is a resounding yes. Now, those dolphin obviously aren’t going to push any fish towards your baits, but…

• When you see dolphin thrashing on the surface and jumping out of the water irregularly in large groups, get over there immediately and get trolling lines in the water. Dolphin you see making that graceful arc as they move through the water are just swimming along, but when you see erratic jumping and splashing, they’re usually feeding. And where the dolphin are feeding, tuna and other pelagic predators are often feeding on the very same prey.
• When you see schools of dolphin tracking in a constant direction at a high rate of speed, there’s a pretty fair chance they’re following a shoal of bait. If they’re headed away from you, you probably won’t able to get ahead of them at trolling speeds. But if they’re travelling at an angle or towards you, you may be able to head them off at the pass and drag your lines ahead of them. Again, other predators may well be hunting the same baitfish.
• When you spot dolphin mixed with whales but don’t see any obvious feeding activity on the surface, there’s a good chance there are squid far below your boat. Squid don’t commonly get chased to the surface during daylight hours but marine mammals — as well as tunas — will dive down deep to hunt them. There is, however, a catch: tunas are cold-blooded. That means they can only stay deep for a certain amount of time before returning to surface waters to warm back up. So when you see the dolphins and whales mixing on the surface, it’s a good move to stick around for a while. Even though you may not get a tuna bite right off the bat, there’s a good chance it’ll happen when those fish return to the surface.

Sure, the dolphin are pretty, and people love seeing them jump and play in the boat’s wake. But more importantly, paying attention to those dolphin and what they’re doing can help you put more fish in the boat.