🐦 Reading Gull & Bird Activity

Seabirds find fish long before you do. Learning to read them turns a blank beach into a map.

Diving terns and gannets: birds folding their wings and diving are hitting baitfish that predators have pushed to the surface. A tight, frantic flock over one spot often means gamefish (garrick, katonkel, yellowtail) or shad smashing bait. Cast a spoon or plug into the edge of the action, not the middle.

Sitting gulls: a raft of gulls resting on the water often marks a bait shoal holding below, or a slick of dead bait — worth a few casts.

Working gulls along the backline: gulls hovering and dipping along a gutter or river mouth are picking at bait being funnelled by the current — a sign fish are feeding there too.

Terns following you: on estuaries, terns will sometimes hover over your retrieve, expecting your lure to push bait up — a good sign you're in the zone.

No birds at all usually means no bait, and no bait means few predators. When the birds switch on, so does the fishing — be ready to move to them fast.