Dolphin fishing is great sport for beginner and expert alike. Look for the three signs and you will usually come home with smiles. Birds, debris and rips constitute fish attracting locations. For the most part all are recognizable but deciphering the subtle signs means the difference between bent rods and hours of hunting.
Birds are easy to spot and can be seen from a long distance. The frigate bird is not able to dive into the water so he follows bait or predatory fish until he has the opportunity to eat. If he is high and moving fast he is just scouting the area looking for something but if he is holding in one area then there are fish nearby. Big dolphin are often hundreds of yards away from the bird so don’t give up after a pass or two. As long as he stays in one area then there is likely fish near by. I won’t give up on a spot until the frigate bird does; after all he has a much better view of the situation than you. Lots of small birds usually means lots of small fish. When you get a school up to the boat keep working them and a big guy might come by. If you sit and wait on that one fish without continually catching schoolies and chumming then they will quickly loose interest in the boat. I like to carry a bag of glass minnows to keep them feeding. If you are equipped with radar, with a little practice, it can usually be tuned to spot birds. Just remember your hooks are behind the boat so avoid running through the school.
Debris is another one that can be hard to find but easy to recognize. Some days you drive for miles through a barren ocean and other days you run in to everything including the kitchen sink. Look for how much bait is under the grass and debris to determine how long to work it. The more bait there is the longer I stay, big dolphin often hang around without coming right in to feed. Some of the biggest dolphin in the lower keys are trolled up a few hundred feet away from the structure. Rips can sometimes be tough to spot and the only thing that tips you off is a small temperature variance. Due to the similar fishing method as weed lines I will group the two together. Any time I find two different color waters colliding with swirling eddies and scattered grass I give it a little while.

Have your "Pitch Bait" rod and reels set up prior to leaving the dock. You will need a 3/0 to 4/0 short shank J hook or circle hook attached to a 5’ fluorocarbon leader. Once you get close to the "Reef" go ahead and attach a ballyhoo or live pinfish to your set-up. You can put the pinfish back in the live well and have him ready to toss at that big bull or cow dolphin you can see in the water.

Another use for the "Pitch Bait" set-ups is when you get into a school of smaller dolphin; we call these "Peanuts" or "Schoolies". When you catch one leave it in the water until you get hooked up on another, if you always leave one in the water the school will stay around the boat and you can have a "BLAST" catching these fish. You can also take glass minnows and scatter them on the surface and the schoolies will hang around. When these schoolies are feeding it is said "You can throw a flip flop with a hook in it and catch a schoolie" Flip flops with a hook are not available but we do endorse what we call a "Dolphin Pitch Bait" these bait are colorful and have a lot of flash witch attract the dolphin.