XL Carp Syndicate Blog Episode 9 2019 end of year round up w/Adam Penning.
Welcome to this festive edition of the Fryerning XL Carp Syndicate Blog Episode 9, a bumper episode crammed full of stunning big carp and smashed P.Bs from over the past twelve months!
2019 was certainly an amazing year at Fryerning carp syndicate… a true great in terms of numbers of fish caught and P.B.s smashed, you can’t fail to be astounded by what you’re about to see, it really was that good!
Those of you who follow these blogs may recall me saying in an earlier blog that we are in urgent need of rain! Well, it seems that we have had nothing but ever since and this has definitely seen an end to the season for most of the members who don’t like to get all their shiny toys wet. Take today as an example, it’s a Friday afternoon, the conditions are just screaming out carp and we are sat here with no other anglers on ANY of the lakes!
Am I surprised…. No not at all, it happens every year at Fryerning Carp Syndicate!!! Once the hour goes back and we get a couple of chilly nights the anglers disappear leaving the banks free for the hardcore carpers out there!
I myself came down last week and was the only angler was on the complex, which is amazing considering the sport which is on offer. In a quick overnighter, I had lovely 21lb common and this was despite the bivvy being iced over.
2019 couldn’t have started off any better, especially for Keith Mann who caught the lakes largest resident just days into the new year. Keith landed Gurm at a whacking 55lb 2oz, his first UK 5O which smashing his P.B. to bits! On the same morning, further along the bank, Dan Crow smashed his P.B too with Pretty One at 39lb 9oz, a double cause for celebration!
What a way to start the year, Keith Mann with Gurm 55lb 2oz.
Dan Crow with Pretty One at 39lb 9oz
Shortly after these two captures, the weather took a turn for the worse with the lakes becoming frozen over which obviously curtailed sport somewhat!
This gave the guys the perfect opportunity to get the netting gear out and remove a good percentage of the silvers from The Main Lake. Two separate nettings saw almost two tonnes of Roach removed, which is key to upping the carp weights. By reducing the bio-mass, it leaves more food for the carp, resulting in bigger healthier specimens! This hard work will hopefully see the carp syndicate lakes get even more 40’s 50’s and its first 60lb carp in the near future!
Over two tones of silverfish were removed from The Main Lake during January
Despite the cold water temperatures, February saw a whole host of fish caught from the Main Lake including 4×40’s, 4×30’s and 6x upper 20’s.
Jim Buffoni managed a brace of winter 40’s with The Emperor at 44lb and Berties Linear at 40lb 4oz, whilst Chris Moore landed carp of 36lb 12oz, 32lb and 27lb, in a weekend he won’t forget in a hurry.
Jim Buffoni with Berties Linear, part of a brace of winter 40’s
Zak Culleton and son Freddie also enjoyed a memorable session landing 4scale at over 40lb in a great father and son session, just check out this picture!
Zac Culleton with 4 scale shared with son Freddie
Another top, top result was Tommy Moores capture of The Woodcarving at nearly 44lb, one of the finest and most sought after carp in The UK. Fish don’t get much better than this and you can find them with us at Fryerning XL Carp, one of the best carp syndicate places available!
Tommy Moore with The Woodcarving, an unbelievable looking fish!
Down on the Valley Lake and Gary Moffatt banked a brute of a 27lb 8oz common, whilst the Car Park was producing some outstanding sport, with carp like this caught by Laura Monier on a tutorial with Adam!
Laura Monier with a cracking Car Park Lake mirror
Towards the end of February, we saw some balmy, record-breaking hot weather and this certainly kicked all three Lakes into life big style!
The Main Lake saw a mind-blowing 25 carp recorded, including Gurm at 56lb and nine different 40’s including fish of 48lb 12oz, 48lb 10oz and 46lb!
Steve Falco with The Netted Fish, 48lb 10oz
The Valley Lake is somewhere I focussed my attention on in March and I managed to land over 20 carp in three sessions, casting to showing fish using Sticky Baits Boilies and the Krill pellets. Incredible fishing, check out Episode Four for more details.
March was a good month for Adam
The month also saw Sam Lane land a terrific 36lb common whilst Mav Smith bagged a 33lb Mirror.
Mav Smith with a 33lb mirror.
If you like your winter fishing you’d be daft not to have a look at these lakes!
With spring just around the corner, April saw the fish go on a feeding frenzy, The carp syndicate Main Lake went into overdrive, with over 50 carp recorded and they weren’t small either, with SEVEN anglers smashing their P.B.s!
Felixstowe based Goldminer Simon Lincoln certainly struck gold that month, when he landed an incredible brace of carp totalling nearly 102lb, whilst Julian Morphew landed that beast of a common, The Mommon at a whacking 47lb! To put things into perspective, the previous April saw 17 carp come out of the Main Lake which was still a respectable total, but the place has just moved on and on since! See April 2018 catch reports.
Simon Lincoln with part of his incredible 102lb brace
As always, members on the Valley were having some fantastic results with Jake Bryan. Rick Neighbour and York Stevens all landing 30’s. The Car Park Lake was producing some seriously big Hauls too, with some real red-letter days being had!
Jake Bryan with a 32lb 2oz P.B. carp
May carried on from April with the fish feeding hard and captures at an all-time high! Mitch Attwood landed four up to 47lb 10oz whilst Roy Prodger also landed 4 including that rare beauty Pretty One at 40lb 8oz and a new Main Lake 40! GET IN!
Roy Prodger with a new Main Lake 40 with Pretty One
The Valley Lake continued to turn dreams into reality, with Darrell Ray smashing his P.B. twice in the same session, upping it to 31lb 4oz, whilst Ian Mitchell also smashed his P.B. twice, upping his to 31lb 12oz!
Darrell Ray with his second P.B. of the session 31lb 4oz
With the fish showing signs of spawning, the decision was made to close the lakes and let the fish get on with it and do their stuff uninterrupted and recover in peace!
June saw the lakes reopen after a two-week break for angling and there was a real sense of excitement in the air on opening day.
The following few weeks saw monstrous amounts of carp caught, with the fish on a mission to replenish their energy levels and get back to peak condition having had a good successful spawn.
The month saw another 50 carp caught from the carp syndicate Main Lake, with some huge hauls banked including a 20 carp in a 72-hour session! One catch that did cause a bit of a stir was one of the 130lb catfish that Nick Royce landed …. on carp gear as well! This is one of only a handful of cats on the complex, so don’t worry if you’re not a great fan of them!
The Main Lake throw up loads of big carp like The Emperor caught by Adam McInnes
130lb Cat Fish caught by Nick Royce
The Valley Lake wasn’t to be left out either with young Ben Edkins smashing his P.B. with a 32lb 3oz common whilst Kane Sutton had a new P.B. of 33lb 8oz and Chris Marchant had one of 30lb 2oz .
Ben Edkins with a 32lb 3oz Common
The fisheries red hot form continued all throughout the Summer months with July and August seeing stupid amounts of Carp caught! The carp syndicate Main Lake catch report book had no fewer than 70 entries for July and 64 for August! What was really pleasing was the carp caught were a good mixture of the established stock and A-Team fish, with some unknown, unnamed specimens which have pushed their way through. These are our very own hand-picked samples from our stock ponds and really do compliment the existing stocks wonderfully!
Just one of the carp that is complimenting the original stock in The Main Lake
July saw Paul Bissett have a session of a lifetime and possibly of the year in the UK when he landed three of the most sought after carp around with Gurm at 49lb 14oz, The Mommon at 42lb and The Woodcarving at 39lb 14oz. Paul also had three small carp up to 31lb!!!
Paul with the Gurm.
The Woodcarving
The Mommon.
Another to enjoy his ‘best ever’ session was Mitch Attwood who landed 18 carp up to 40lb which included plenty of The A-Team.
Mitch Attwood with Whinger 39lb 14oz, part of an 18 carp haul
The month saw me spend a couple of days filming down on the Carp Syndicate Valley doing an episode for Hooked, The summer hunt! On two of the hottest days of the year I managed to land seven carp up to 30lb, whilst a return visit a week later saw me land two more in a couple of hours floater fishing! Magical times, check out the video and see exactly how I did it!
Adam with a cracking Mirror caught from The Valley on a floater.
Again more P.B.s were smashed that month with Fin Richardson and Darren Bryan smashing there’s with fish of 26lb 10oz and 31lb respectively!
Fin with a new P.B. 26lb 10oz
Darren Bryan with a 31lb new P.B.
It’s very noticeable that once the school holidays arrive, angler numbers on the banks decrease drastically once again! Fishing is put on the back burner for a couple of months with family holidays, which make these phenomenal catches even more significant!
During this holiday period one of, if not the largest Leathers in the UK came out to the rods of Paul Bryant when he landed The Netted fish at 40lb and smashed his P.B. in style!
Paul Bryant with The Netted Fish 40lb
Consistent carp catchers Steve Falco and Tommy Flower also had prolific months with Steve landing a trio of the A-Team with The Emperor, Dalmation and Charlie whilst Tommy bagged five of the most wanted including The Netted, Berties Linear, No Name, Charlie and a big Grassie!
Steve Falco with The Emperor, one of three A-Team carp.
Tommy Flower with No Name just one of many for the man on form.
The Lancashire Carp Baits Team also rocked up all the way from Blackpool and as always enjoyed themselves immeasurably landing a few along the way toppled by a cracking 30lb mirror.
Jamie Wilding, part of the Lancashire Carp Baits team.
Josh Hefford and Kane Sutton were talk of The Valley, landing stacks of fish up to 31lb, whilst Fin Richardson smashed his P.B. yet again!
Kane Sutton with just one of his many carp from The Valley Lake in August.
The autumn months of September and October saw the amounts of carp caught slightly decrease but numbers were certainly made up for by quality. The Valley Lake as always was guilty of smashing more P.B.s such as this, a new thirty caught by Dean O’Callaghan with his son Cooper and a 35lb common for York Stevens.
Dean O’Callagham and son Cooper with a new Valley Lake 30.
York Stevens with a cracking 35lb Valley Lake P.B.
Main Lake member Chris Rutt fancied a change so headed down to The Valley and was also rewarded with a brace of commons going 35lb 12oz and 28lb 2oz.
Chris Rutt had a productive session on The Valley landing commons of 35lb 12oz and 28lb 2oz
Mark Filby was another to smash his P.B. twice whilst on a session with Ian Russell! In a session he will never forget, Mark had three commons of 26lb 6oz, 29lb 6oz and 31lb 8oz! It was a great couple of months for those on the Valley!
Mark Filby with his new P.B. A 31LB 8OZ common, one of three caught with Ian Russell
Back on The Main Lake and Elliot Bertram made the headlines with over twenty carp including The Dalmation, Starburst, The Netted, 4 scale and The Zip Linear, to name a few whilst Jason Loveday had the Gambler at 39lb and Danny Spears caught Charlie, one of the oldest fish in the Lake!
Elliot Bertram had an amazing month landing stacks of fish including The Zip Linear at 35lb 2oz
Danny Spears with Charlie one of the oldest fish in The Main Lake
November saw the first frosts of the year and enormous amounts of rainfall. Although some hardy souls have been down, generally the Lakes have been empty with nobody on them at all which has obviously seen fish numbers drop, if you aren’t on the bank you ain’t going to catch them!
This month has seen XL Pecs come out at her best weight ever at 45lb 10oz when caught by Dave Westwood whilst Tom Cook smashed his P.B. with The Emperor at 44lb 8oz. Kevin Deeming and Steve Lockwood landed fish of 32lb 6oz and 31lb 12oz.
Dave Westwood with XL Pecks at her largest weight yet 45lb 10oz
With so few anglers on the banks, we have made a big concerted effort to keep feeding all the Fishing Lakes and stock ponds intensely. The start of December saw us take delivery of several tonnes of Micronised Barley and a new sustainable pellet.
The new sustainable pellets
Having previously fed the lakes with high protein fish meal pellets, we decided a more greener, environmentally friendly food source was needed. The whole estate at the FryerningCarp Syndicate has been organic and pesticide-free now for over 30 years so we thought the lakes should be the same!
Not only do the carp thrive at Fryerning so does a whole host of wildlife, thanks to this amazing habitat we have created. Just a few species include; Nighting Gales, Bitterns, Shoveler Ducks, masses of Egrets and even Water Voles from time to time. We feel it essential to work with nature and by going more sustainable this is another step in the right direction.
It’s great to see nature thriving at Fryerning
This will undoubtedly improve our Water quality even further, the growth rates and the condition of the Carp! With this new feeding programme, we fully expect sport to be better than ever in 2020. With plenty of carp now reaching upper 40lb weights, these could go 50lb and we fancy the chances of a 60!
The pellets are available to buy at a really affordable £15 for 10kg. Don’t forget we still stock Mainline freezer bait so you are well catered for bait wise at Fryerning.
As always much work is carried out during the year and one which you can’t fail to notice is the refurb to The Log swim on The Carp Syndicate Main Lake. this has now been increased in size and turned into one of the most comfortable swims on the estate.
The Log Swim fully refurbished for 2020
Something else which is bound to catch you in the eyes is the skull which was commissioned and placed upon a plinth overlooking both the Carp Syndicate Valley and Car Park Lakes. If you haven’t seen it whilst you have been down, have a wander and take a look, you can’t fail to be impressed!
The Skull situated between The Valley Lake and Car Park Lakes
Those of you who are have been down may have noticed that we have had some issues with the water supplies recently. Well after months of hard work we are pleased to announce this has now been resolved and we are now fully independent from outside sources.
One of the new water tanks being lowered into position.
This is thanks to a big investment into a state of the art water filtration system and of course the many man-hours of work! The water is taken from the lake and filtered and is far superior to what you would get out of your tap at home.
The State of the art water filtration system!
As from January 2020, a very limited amount of mid-week tickets are available for The Valley Lakes. These run from Sunday 12 pm until Friday 12 pm and gives you access to both The Carp Syndicate Valley and The Car Park Lakes. If you are interested in one of these tickets or any other interested to know how to become a member at Fryerning please either give us a ring on 01277 352245 to book yourself an appointment and have a look around the fishery!
Finally, I would like to round off by wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a prosperous and carp packed 2020 from everyone at Fryerning XL Carp, one of the best Carp Syndicate places available.
