A Nighttime Rescue in Crystal River

Capt. Justin Dymond of Florida Bowfishing Adventures in Crystal River contacted Clearwater Marine Aquarium (CMA) in December to report that a dolphin he had been seeing regularly during his nighttime bow-and-arrow fishing charters had line wrapped around its tail fluke. Dymond uses a bright light to attract fish during these charters and a group of dolphins regularly follows his boat for hours, appearing to fish cooperatively with him and often swimming right in front of the bow of his boat.

Personnel from the National Marine Fisheries Service, the federal agency responsible for overseeing the stewardship of marine mammals in U.S. waters, determined that a remote disentanglement attempt would be appropriate and asked the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program to help.

On the evening of Jan. 23, 2026, SDRP Field Manager and Senior Researcher Aaron Barleycorn and a team from CMA and the University of Florida joined Dymond to attempt to remove the gear remotely from the free-swimming dolphin. Using a long-handled cutting tool, Aaron was able to cut two of the three wraps around where the tail stock meets the fluke, but could not completely remove the gear.

After the cuts were made, the dolphin stayed near the boat, but would not come close enough for the team to make another attempt. The team spent several more hours trying to remove the gear with no success and ended the rescue effort around 10 p.m. The team hoped that they had cut enough of the gear to allow the rest to fall off on its own.

On Feb. 13, CMA staff joined Dymond on a charter, locating the dolphin — CMA2514 — and were delighted to see that the rest of the gear had indeed fallen off! The dolphin appeared to be in good body condition and was behaving normally and CMA will continue to monitor the dolphin in the future. Special thanks to Capt. Dymond for alerting CMA, allowing this dolphin to be freed from entangling line.

We know that one of the main causes of dolphin deaths is related to human actions, with fishing gear entanglement, hooking, or ingestion being the most frequent causes of mortality. Please be dolphin safe! Follow these tips to help keep dolphins healthy:

  • Reel in your fishing line if dolphins appear.
  • Change locations if dolphins show interest in bait or catch.
  • Don’t feed dolphins – it is illegal and trains the dolphins to engage in dangerous behaviors.
  • Release catch quietly away from dolphins when and where it is possible to do so without violating any state or federal fishing regulations.
  • Check gear and terminal tackle to make sure it won’t break off easily and, if your line does break, be sure to collect anything left behind in mangroves or on docks.
  • Use circle and corrodible hooks and don’t use braided fishing line.
  • Stay at least 50 yards away from dolphins.
  • Stash your trash in a lidded container on your boat until you can get to shore and dispose of it safely in a place where it will not blow back into the water.

Click here to learn more about dolphin-safe fishing

CMA2514 shown here free of the entangling gear.