I’ve fished it 3 times in Summer and once in Autumn. I’ve only fished Side Winder lake , which is a perculiar snake lake from 8-16 mtrs wide. It has lots of nook and crannies. The summer matches were won with weights in excess of 100lbs and one occasion this came from a peg 8 mtrs wide and included fish to 10lbs.

On last occsaion I was drawn in an open area with no features and caught about 45 F1’s and small commons for 65lbs.

Not the most picturesque of waters but worth a visit and watch out for the Alpacas in the fields

Yes, there’s a toilet in those farm buildings. They do breakfast there as well.

We fished the long lake once, it was very patchy. I think there’s 20 pegs and each one has a pole rest built out of scaffold poles behind it. It was quite windy the day we fished it….three broken poles !. We did have it booked for a match this last season but Rob moved the match to the snake lake because the long lake wasn’t fishing well.

We’ve only fished Sidewinder in the summer, so can’t comment on a February visit. The lake changed completely between the first and second year that it was open, First year he’d stocked a load of tiny crucians, carp, F1’s etc plus a few “proper” uns that all shoaled up in Plummers peg 😡

Last winter he stocked a load of F1’s between maybe 4 ozs and 1 lb and most of the big ones have been moved. The F1’s seem to be growing well, they’re really nice fish.

Well worth a visit 🙂

😉 I know someone who fished it mid-week on a very small knock-up (ice in the Margins) and they all caught a fair few F1’s