While some marlin were seen around the New Year period, they have definitely increased as the month has moved on, and there have been plenty of sailfish all along, both in the Rips and off Malindi up north and in the Pemba Channel at Shimoni in the south.

The Shimoni boats have been busy, with both Kamara II and White Otter scoring a striped marlin and a sailfish at the beginning of the week, and Broadbill and Clueless, down from Malindi, both tagging four sail.

Next day, Broadbill had a memorable day with a party of Russian anglers, getting a black and a striped marlin, as well as two sail, for a grand slam, while Clueless had five sail and White Otter two. The following day, Broadbill had another stripey, while Kamara II found four sail, but the day after no marlin were caught, only sailfish.

Broadbill then caught two stripies and Kamara II a blue marlin, following up the day after with a nice blue marlin of 140kgs and five sail for Kamara II and one stripey and a sail for White Otter, so the fishing in that area really good.

In the Watamu area the boats have been concentrating on the Rips, although tongues of green water have been moving down with the wind and the fish have been moving around. At the beginning of the week, B’s Nest found a hot spot and tagged two stripies, a sail and a small shark, but many boats found the going slow and went for the bottom fishing option.

White Bear with the Kenyon family caught 26 snapper and five grouper, while on Ol Jogi the Bairstow family found 36 snapper, together with a couple of amberjack and two grouper, while next day Black Widow with Chris Evans as angler found sailfish and tagged seven.

Unreel had a good run in the first few days of the New Year with three stripeys in three trips, then Tarka became the hot boat, totalling nine stripeys in five consecutive days, including a good day with three - that same day, Tuesday, Castle Lager also had three stripeys, and Tega caught a black marlin and five sail so a busy day for anglers there. Castle Lager had two stripeys a couple of days later, while Alleycat has been finding stripies along with sailfish for a successful week. Clueless came back from Shimoni and tagged a stripey and a sail, while Kipapa also came up to Watamu from Mtwapa via the Rips and tagged three sail on the way.

Malindi boats have been fishing in their local waters most successfully for sailfish, although things went quieter over the New Year, but Kiki Fernandes managed to tag two sail on fly tackle  on Snowgoose. On Friday last week the sail were more active, with Snark and Snowgoose getting eight and Eclare five.

The Casino Malindi tournament will be fished this weekend, and skippers will have the choice of sail closer in and the chance of striped marlin further out, so there should be plenty of billfish caught.