Captive dolphins in marine parks and swim programs experience profound welfare deficits from confinement in conditions incompatible with their natural ecology and sophisticated cognitive needs.
Captive dolphins face persistent welfare deficits that no tank can adequately address. Their echolocation system - an exquisitely sensitive biological sonar - receives constant reflections from pool walls, creating an unavoidable acoustic environment that has no analogue in their natural ocean habitat. Social groupings in captivity rarely match the complex fission-fusion dynamics of wild dolphin societies. The cognitive sophistication of dolphins - their self-awareness, problem-solving, and cultural transmission - makes inadequate enrichment particularly welfare-significant. The evidence base against dolphin captivity has become sufficiently strong that progressive jurisdictions are phasing it out.