The official season for the Kenya Association of Sea Anglers, KASA, runs to the end of April annually, for recording purposes, but as April progresses the sea gets rough as the wind blows, and most boats are taken out of the water for their annual overhaul or laid up in placid harbours.
There is no legal close season in Kenya, one can fish any month of the year, and indeed in some areas it is possible to catch sailfish and indeed marlin at any time, but between April and early July these prized fish are rare, the waters get rough and very few fishing trips are made, while many hotels shut down for a month or two for annual maintenance so there are no clients anyway!
Kasa held their annual end of season party this year in a new manner, with a sundowner evening on dhows in Mida Creek, organised by Turtle Bay Resort’s general manager Damian Davies and David Darnborough, to whom many thanks for a splendid evening with drinks and a delicious array of bitings.
The tickets for the annual raffle were drawn, with over forty fantastic prizes ranging from hotel and lodge stays to fishing trips on most of the top charter boats, and thanks to all the donors for these terrific prizes – a big sum of money was made to keep this organisation running, as although it is the official governing body of the sport in Kenya, it gets no official support.
Game fishing is not just a sport, but a very big and important industry, bringing in huge amounts of foreign currency to the country as a major part of the tourist industry, and Kenya is indeed fortunate in having the best fishing in Africa, as well as the best charter fleet of modern boats.
Not many trips have been made this last week, and catches consisted mainly of wahoo, yellowfin tuna and dorado, all good eating fish, but the wind has started blowing hard the last two days.
On the whole it has only been a moderate season, below average for both sail and marlin, but fishermen are always optimists and we are confident the new season will bring bountiful angling! This column will close now till it gets busy in again in August, and we are confident for a great future with political and economic stability under the new regime.
