Anybody who has been out game fishing over the last couple of weeks will know we are experiencing what is the best Striped Marlin bite I can remember off Sydney, especially for so early in the season. To make it even better the Stripies are all of good size. Listening to reports it is apparent that the bite is slowly moving South and maybe the best of it has already gone by as there is a good bite down the coast from Stanwell Park South. Anyway, we were going out to what looked like an edge a few miles North of Browns. I went with Zac and some of his friends in what were ideal conditions, maybe even a little too calm. We caught some live bait intending to either use them as skippies or on Dollies if we went to a FAD. We put the lures in at eighty fathoms where there had been a few fish taken during the week and trolled North zig zagging between eighty and a hundred and ten fathoms. There was heaps of bait, mostly in small schools and lots of Dolphins, not to be confused with Mahi Mahi, possibly why the bait was broken up into small schools, so expectations were high. It was on one of those zigs that we got a hit on the shotgun but no hook up. Steve and Ollie, my deckies saw the strike and said it was a small Marlin or maybe a Spearfish. Whatever it was hit the ‘Brad’ so hard the lure flew a few metres out of the water, damned if I know why it didn’t hook up. We continued further on and as we went the bait started to disperse. I decided then to have a look out wider and head South towards Browns. Just over the shelf I ran into a school of what looked like Striped Tuna and worked the area for a while to no avail, so headed South again. In three hundred fathoms and ten miles North of Browns Brad got smashed and we were on to a very nice Stripy which gave in after about twenty minutes and was brought boatside by some good angling. We didn’t see anything else for the rest of the day but the guys were satisfied both fishwise and beerwise so we turned West and headed for home. In conclusion it appears another run of Stripies has come down the coast. Reports coming in today of most boats encountering these fish. Being so early in the season and with the best Marlin months still ahead of us one can’t help but be optimistic about the days ahead. Tight Lines, Ivan