Offshore there was some absolutely crazy billfish action, with far too many boats and anglers to name individually.

There were blue, black and striped marlin smashing bait balls from up north of Sydney all the way down to the Victoria border and beyond.

Locally, it seemed all the fish were mainly taken on the troll.

Even though the bait fish were being hammered, the billies were just not interested in any well-presented trolled livies or drifted live baits.

There were ridiculous numbers being thrown out over the radio all weekend, with quite a few boats hitting double digits for the two days of brilliant fishing - the best going 12-7-7 in one day, with many coming close to 20 for the weekend.

Many crews reported they could not remember seeing the water looking as clean and as blue for quite some time.

Last Tuesday there were billfish being hooked and fought over both Bandit and Trap reefs, so it looks like marlin mania has finally arrived.

There were also reports of hordes of dollies on the FADs and a couple of bulls that were taken over the weekend weighed close to the 20-kilogram mark.

Beaches have been a bit of a hit-and-miss affair, with lots of weed on most beaches, but that seems to be settling down as the weather improves.

There were plenty of big salmon and tailor about - dawn and dusk on both lures and baits - and some good-sized sea bream and tarwhine were landed by fishing with lighter gear in the shore breaks. A shop customer weighed in some solid bream with three fish over the kilo mark caught at MM beach on live worms.

The whiting have been thick over the last week but the beach worms have been a bit tricky to find of late. Once you find them, however, fishing is the easy bit.

Website: www.reeldealfishing.com.au

Email: gazwade@bigpond.com