Ted Dunn was born and raised in San Diego, California. By the age of thirteen, he had already started building lobster boats and before he graduated junior high school he had three Summer jobs working on sport-fishing boats behind him. In High School, Ted Dunn had already begun working on commercial fishing vessels and he also studied engineering and celestial navigation. By the age of nineteen, Ted had bought his first fishing boat called the Don Q and began fishing Albacore in the Summer and offshore lobsters in the winters. Three years later, Ted purchased a larger vessel named the Mary K. Ted then began fishing Albacore, Yellowfin and Skipjack ;selling his catch to the canneries of San Diego and Los Angeles. At this time, he became an active member of the Board of Directors for the Western Fish Boat Organization, and also helped form the American Research Foundation for Tuna. Off-season, Ted worked as a Port Engineer for Tuna Seiners and he also worked in diesel repair of General Motor’s engines.
Ted continued to expand his career, and approximately 4 years later he built his second Tuna vessel also named the Mary K. He began consulting and chartering for the Inter American Tropical Tuna Commission. Successfully he tagged over 50,000 tuna in a three year period on the Eastern Pacific. Once again, he successfully completed a 120-day exploratory trip fishing and tagging in the Marquesas and Society Islands. Ted built and designed a laboratory site in Panama for holding Tuna in captivity and designed a system for capturing and transporting live Tuna from sea to the land base tanks.
Also, Ted worked jointly with Woodshole University and IATTC designing, tagging and tracking the first acoustical-tagged fish. Back on the West Coast, he also captured live Tuna for specially designed display tanks for the Monterey Aquarium in Northern California.
In 1985, Ted Dunn and Frank Lo Preste formed Lo Preste-Dunn Sportfishing Inc. and Dunn-Lo Preste Boatyard Inc. Ted designed and built two 90′ long-range sportfishing boats, the Royal Star and the Shogun, which operate out of San Diego, California, and Mexico. This business specializes in catching large Bluefin Tuna.
In 1996, Ted joined partnership with Phillipe Charat to form Ocean Farmers and Maricultura Del Norte to pioneer and create the first Tuna Farms in the America’s based in Ensenada Baja, CA. Ted manages all capturing and holding for Maricultura Del Norte.
In all of North America, Ted Dunn was the first to successfully capture and hold Yellowfin and Bluefin Tuna in ocean pens. Currently, Ted resides in La Jolla, California where he is owner and founder of Ted Dunn Inc. for Marine Consulting, and Partner/Project Manager of Maricultura Del Norte. Ted Dunn strives for excellence and top quality for the world Tuna market.