No dolphin leaps like a spinner: it shoots out of the water and twists around its own length up to seven times before splashing down. Off Cabo you meet the eastern spinner, a small gray form found only in the eastern tropical Pacific.
A small, slim dolphin with a very long, thin beak. The eastern spinner seen off Cabo is plain gray on the back and sides, with small white patches in the armpits and around the genital area, instead of the three-tone pattern of spinners elsewhere. Adult males have an upright dorsal fin that can even lean forward, and a deep keel (the post-anal hump) on the underside of the tail stock.
There are four recognized subspecies, and two of them live only in the eastern Pacific. The eastern spinner (S. l. orientalis) ranges through a huge triangle of ocean whose base runs from about the tip of Baja California (around 24°N) south to Peru, so Los Cabos sits at its northern edge. The Central American spinner (S. l. centroamericana) is a larger, coastal form found within about 80 km of shore from the Gulf of Tehuantepec to Costa Rica, far south of Cabo. Offshore, eastern spinners mix with Gray’s spinners in a broad zone of intermediate animals known as whitebelly spinners.
Spinners feed mostly at night on small midwater fish under 20 cm, including lanternfish, plus squid and small shrimp, following prey that rises toward the surface after dark. Jumbo (Humboldt) squid has been reported in their diet in the Gulf of California. Schools range from a few animals to a thousand or more and are usually bigger offshore. In the eastern tropical Pacific, yellowfin tuna travel with spinner schools, the link that made the eastern spinner one of the main victims of the tuna purse-seine fishery.
A 2006 study showed spinners cannot twist their bodies enough to spin in the air. They build up the rotation underwater by corkscrewing before the leap, and once airborne the spin speeds up by as much as three times.
Source ↗A single spinner can make up to 14 spinning leaps in a row, each a little weaker than the last. Leaps up to 3 m high and 1.25 seconds in the air have been measured.
Source ↗One explanation for the spinning: the force of re-entering the water while rotating fast could be enough to knock off remoras stuck to the dolphin’s body.
Source ↗In 1986, tuna purse seiners in the eastern Pacific killed an estimated 19,526 eastern spinners. In 2024, under the dolphin program run by the IATTC, the estimate was 300.
Source ↗Fishing mortality cut the eastern spinner population by about 65%, and the IUCN describes its recovery as slow at best.
Source ↗Central American spinners rarely “carry” tuna, so purse seiners almost never caught them. That is why so few specimens existed when the subspecies was named in 1990.
Source ↗Spinners are offshore dolphins, and Cabo sits at the northern edge of the eastern spinner’s range, so they are an occasional, lucky sighting rather than an everyday one. Naturalists on expedition ships have reported spinner dolphins close to Cabo San Lucas. You are most likely to meet them in blue water, where a fast-moving school can light up the horizon with spinning leaps.
Enjoy them from the boat: keep a steady course and speed, let them choose to ride the bow, don’t drive through or split up a school, and never feed them or try to swim with them. Keep lines and lures clear when spinners are around.
| Mexico (NOM-059) | Subject to special protection (Pr) |
|---|---|
| Ley General de Vida Silvestre, art. 60 Bis | No extractive use or possession of any marine mammal, except authorized research and conservation |
| Whale-watching rules (NOM-131) | Do not apply: NOM-131 covers only baleen whales and the sperm whale |
| Tuna fishery | Eastern spinner deaths in eastern Pacific purse seining are capped per stock and per year and tracked by observers under the IATTC’s International Dolphin Conservation Program |
| CITES | Appendix II |
| IUCN Red List | Least Concern (2018) |
The common dolphin is stockier, with a shorter beak and a crisscross “hourglass” of tan and gray on its sides. The pantropical spotted dolphin is spotted, with a white-tipped beak. The bottlenose dolphin is much bigger, with a short, thick beak. If a small gray dolphin with a needle-thin beak is twisting in the air, it’s a spinner.
Sometimes. Cabo is at the northern edge of the eastern spinner’s range, so they are an occasional offshore sighting.
Nobody knows for sure. Dolphin leaps have been linked to breathing, play, communication and getting rid of parasites, and one study found the spin could knock off remoras.
Globally they are Least Concern on the IUCN Red List, but the eastern spinner lost about 65% of its numbers to the tuna fishery. In Mexico they are subject to special protection (Pr) under NOM-059, and no marine mammal may be captured or kept.
Top illustration: Top Anglers. Photos: iNaturalist contributors, credited on each photo.
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