RDAA Fisheries Feedback April 2026

Added: 2026-05-24

[00:00:03][music] >> Hi there and welcome to a somewhat belated April edition of our RBAA video feedback. Apologies for the delay in putting all this together, but this time of the year is when the fish decide to spawn and Dell and Jim have been incredibly busy at the hatchery, plus I've been away for a week, so we're not normally this slow off the blocks, but hopefully it'll be worth it. You can hear more about what's been happening in the hatchery later.

[00:00:36]And certainly looking outside, we're now experiencing at long last some mild southwesterly as it looks like. For the bank holiday weekend, we're going to be having 28°, which is amazing. Because frankly only last week it was frost frost in the second week in May. Which has made fishing conditions incredibly difficult, but that hasn't stopped our members catching really great fish. I've been genuinely surprised about how good the fishing has been on some of our lakes. So let's go and see what's been happening and find out what the team and Dell have been up to.

[00:01:09]Okay, fishers report. Dell, you're looking a bit knackered today. What's the problem?

[00:01:13]>> had enough. I've had enough. Sick and tired of sitting in the hatchery. Yeah.

[00:01:18]But it was your idea.

[00:01:19]>> I know. I know. I've got no one to blame but myself.

[00:01:23]Anyway, tell me how tell me how the hatchery's going. I understand you've got the you've got the brood stock, haven't you? Yeah. Yeah, we've got the brood stock. They've all been stripped and put back into the river.

[00:01:33]Huge success with the chub. Not so good with the barbel, unfortunately. We've still got plenty of fish, but not as much as we hoped.

[00:01:41]>> [snorts] >> We hit our target with the with the chub and some, to be honest. We didn't hit our target with the with the barbel.

[00:01:49]But we're going to have years like that, you know, one one species will do better than another and and this that and the other, but yeah.

[00:01:56]It's just been the last couple of weeks just been quite stressful long days early mornings that sort of stuff and I'm sick to death of looking at the inside of it and what what hasn't helped is Jim had this great idea of insulating it and it's like all multi-colored so it's like being in your own sort of psychedelic world when you're in there. I knew it would be Jim's fault. Anyways, back to back to the actual function of the hatchery. So you've got the EA guys down which is a good picture up with the boom boat.

[00:02:30]Good spread of chub.

[00:02:32]As I understand it the barbel one of the problems was you got too many big ones and not enough smaller ones. Is that right? Yeah, yeah, we we >> why that's a problem? Well, basically I mean they're no different to us in so much as you know, the older you are the less fertile you are and the longer it takes to get things working.

[00:02:52]Yeah, exactly. We're all of that sort of age excluding young Matt there obviously he's got to tie him down. But yeah, basically they're just they're older fish. So they're slower to do everything. We've we've got facilities to keep the fish for about 72 hours and then we're at the point where we really ought be getting them back into the river and as it has proved with the bigger fish that isn't quite long enough.

[00:03:22]So we get a little bit of spawn out of them but we don't get the maximum potential out of them. So we would rather have smaller female barbel because they they basically work a lot quicker and a bit more virile if you like.

[00:03:36]>> [snorts] >> Unfortunately, you know, we the EA struggled to get some so we actually went out and used our own kit on the following Monday I think it was um We've always had the facility to be able to go and do it ourselves, um but for all sorts of reason we we wanted the EA involved. Um and also I never electrofished a river. You know, our electrofishing kit is designed for lakes and I've never really used it on a river.

[00:04:07]Um so we didn't know whether it'd work.

[00:04:10]So it was as much as anything it was an experiment. Um but what came out of it is, you know, we done really well.

[00:04:17]So in terms of numbers, uh what do you think you might have in terms of uh of hatch chub at the moment?

[00:04:25]Uh it's it's difficult.

[00:04:28]Um I reckon we've got somewhere in the region of 100,000 fry plus.

[00:04:36]Um That's an incredible achievement. Oh, I mean when you look in the in the in the tank, um I've got a couple of stills.

[00:04:43]Um they'll probably go up now. Um it it's incredible. Absol- You know, I I sometimes I have to pinch myself sometimes, you know.

[00:04:52]Um but it's very difficult because we we lump the barbel and the chub in together, you can only tell the difference between the the chub and the barbel for about 3 days after hatching cuz the the barbel are slightly different. They they hatch like a tadpole, whereas the chub are more fish-like.

[00:05:11]Um but the barbel then evolve over 3 or 4 days, use their egg sac up, and then they look exactly the same as and you're talking things that are 5 mil long. What so what sort of success did they have? And and were the dace successful? Yeah, dace dace were okay. We still got a lot to learn with the dace. The dace are proving to be, you know, a bit of a pain to be honest.

[00:05:32]Um but we will crack it. Um we certainly we've we've more than doubled what we had last year, but you know, I'm still not happy with the amount that we've got. I want to get more.

[00:05:43]Um so we're going to be trying different things. I mean, we're still learning.

[00:05:46]Um and the thing is with this thing this sort of thing we get one chance a year.

[00:05:52]If I If I could do it every day of the week, in 2 weeks I'd have it sussed and we'd be away and going, but you get one chance a year.

[00:06:01]So, if you want to try something different, you've got to wait a year to do it. So, you know, we we will get there and, you know, but it is just an absolutely massive learning curve. A lot lot bigger than I thought it would be.

[00:06:18]>> [snorts] >> And this year, I think we have I think it's safe to say we've learned more this year than we have done in the total two previous years. The The first year we just wanted to produce fish, which was relatively easy.

[00:06:35]Um but we're now at the stage where we're trying to refine it to get more bang for our buck. But you don't want to be too hard on yourself because I mean, you know, it's year three. We're starting from We're going from a standing start and we're now talking tens of thousands of fish that are being reintroduced to the Kennet that would not have survived the crayfish.

[00:06:54]>> Yeah. I mean, I I would and I'm I'm sort of I'm guessing here, but I would say in terms of chub, I would say we have got more chub to a 2-week-old stage, so 5-mil up-swimming fry, I think we've got more chub in that hatchery now than that would be that would survive in the river to that stage from Reading to Newbury. I'm sure you're right. I'm sure you're right. Well, look, we're not all about the hatchery. The hatchery's a big thing that we do and it's groundbreaking stuff and I I'm personally very proud of it and I know the members are very proud of it and thanks for everyone who's donated the towards the quite extensive running costs, but there are other waters that we need and other projects that we've got.

[00:07:40]>> We have a day job. Yeah. And what what's Jim been doing on the day job? Um Listen to me moan, I suppose.

[00:07:48]No, basically it's that time of year, everything's growing.

[00:07:53]We get a little bit of dull weather and things stop, then we get a little bit of rain, a bit of sunshine, boom, up comes again. So, yeah, now it's grass cutting, hedge cutting, all those sort of bits and pieces that sort of get sort of overlooked, if you like.

[00:08:09]And how And how about And how about Brownlee's? Yeah, Brownlee, we've been up to Brownlee with the success of Cottage Lane. Although, you know, I'm at pains to say and I keep saying this, Cottage Lane isn't finished yet, it's work in progress.

[00:08:24]With the success we've had with water quality there, we thought we'd we'd do something similar at Brownlee. So, basically, we went round and we scouted, essentially, for want of a better word.

[00:08:35]We also cut a huge wind channel on Angler's Field on the same bank. So, basically, it funnels the wind across and you can stand on Brownlee now and it's got it's got a ripple.

[00:08:48]So, that's increasing the water quality, which means, ultimately, come this winter, we can then stock some more fish in there. We've also put a a pump in there, so we can actually pump fresh water from Angler's Field into Brownlee and then it will work its way through the system, so we get a turnover of water as well. So, all of that will enable us to stock more fish than, you know, a pond full of trees could hold.

[00:09:17]>> And these little fish are all right.

[00:09:18]Yeah, exactly. Well, I mean, I have to say, looking at the pictures now, the I know the project's not finished yet, but the fish are looking in fantastic condition, apparently. And I think the fishing's improved already.

[00:09:28]>> Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that 100%. I mean, I think it was within hours of us cutting this wind channel, you could actually stay see fish starting to move around, starting to top around in in in the blow that was across the lake.

[00:09:41]>> You're looking for the opportunity.

[00:09:41]Yeah, yeah.

[00:09:44]I I don't think you could stress enough the value of opening up wind channels on on your legs and things like that. Well, I think that's a that that that's a a good point to stop there. Let's just move on to some announcements that we need to make. We need to remind you and and here's the poster.

[00:10:03]July the 4th open day with Martin Bowler. We've got one or two slots left for car boot sale car boot stalls. Only a fiver.

[00:10:12]Just message me or email me to to book your slot. Should be a good day.

[00:10:17]Martin is possibly the most successful around Angler in the country and it's very rare he agrees to do one of these.

[00:10:22]Ah, yes. It's the first time for a long time and I had to get, you know, an arm and a half up his back to come out and do it.

[00:10:30]We're really fortunate in so much as we have good relationships with a lot of these guys and you [snorts] know, I like to think that they they they enjoy coming along and helping us out. Well, we certainly had some great great guests in the past with David Seaman, Paul Whitehouse, Keith Keith Arthur. I mean, it's it's been good to see them, isn't it?

[00:10:48]>> Yeah. Ah, [snorts] right. And also, it's been busy. The coaching team have been out there with their full coaching program. We'll put the posters posters up so people can make a note of what's coming up. And Steve Reed and his team from the Better Fishing Academy, they've run sessions on Fox Field, on lure fishing.

[00:11:07]In fact, tonight the night we're filming, they're doing one down at College Lane on carp fishing. I think Jim's going to help out at that. That that should produce a few fish. We had a very successful tench workshop and I think Dave very kindly came along and he shot some video clips so we're we'll play those in a minute.

[00:11:28]It's what is really encouraging is to see the people who've been to those Mhm.

[00:11:33]It's the progression. and then see the next year or the year after that >> Yeah. they're on our Facebook page with fish of lifetimes.

[00:11:40]>> Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. using the tactics they learned. And I think it's fabulous that that we've got a club that's passing on its knowledge and information and stuff.

[00:11:48]>> that's that's as far as you know, people are probably sick to death of hearing it.

[00:11:53]That's part of the community we're trying to create.

[00:11:55]>> Absolutely.

[00:11:57]You know, who who knows in years to come those people who learn those lessons and have gone out and caught all of these fish and and whatever, they'll then in turn pass that knowledge on at one of our do's. Well, well So, well, in actual fact, Kevin Hargreaves, um, he was part of the It absolutely was and you'll you'll see some text from Kevin later when we when we roll the gallery. Now, we've also got the stick float session coming up on the Kennet at Seal on the 8th of August and uh, the barbel session. I'm not sure whether are they having an upper bendings or lower bendings?

[00:12:28]>> I'll be honest, I don't know. Well, anyway, Without without looking, I don't know. But the barbel session is coming up on on on the Kennet on the 19th of August as well. There may be slots available there. Again, email Steve or send him a message and see if he can put yourselves onto that. Although they're not allowed to catch any more babies.

[00:12:46]No, no, no, no, no, no. They've got to use big baits. Yeah, yeah, I was going to say. So, I think now it's time to roll the gallery. Fishing pictures of the month of April.

[00:12:54]>> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Well, that was the uh month of April. Um not bad.

[00:14:19]Not bad at all considering I had frost, gale force winds. I think mainly the wind came from the north at the time.

[00:14:26]It was horrible. Changeable would be the uh the the the weather term for that, I think. Uh well, I mean, let's just have a quick look at some of these some of these shots. I mean, the first the first one I want to highlight, actually, before you come on to award your prize, is right at the end of the gallery there. Aiden Jordan. Uh we gave Aiden a prize for that big perch last year, do you remember?

[00:14:47]He's gone down a brown lake just after the work had been done, and you can see the wind. It's what you were saying earlier. You can see the wind ripple across the water. Look at the condition of that fish.

[00:14:56]>> Yeah, yeah, let's see. I mean, if you was to sort of paint a picture of a common carp, it would be like that.

[00:15:01]Right shape, everything. It's it's nice.

[00:15:04]I think Jordan, another youngster that fishes Brownsea's young Benjamin Scott.

[00:15:08]Uh now, Ben catches a few fish. He's doing all right. He He needs to work on his photography, but he has absolutely got a cracker here. We don't normally feature fish in nets, but I love that shot of that carp.

[00:15:21]>> bit different. Yeah, it's a little bit different whether it was on the or by accident I don't know but it's it's nice. That's a good that's a good that's a good shot. Although I did have to look twice cuz that looks like he's hurt his thumb and he's got a plaster [laughter] on it and then I realized it's a pectoral thing isn't it?

[00:15:41]Can't not ignore young Ava McDonald comes out with her dad Ashley seems to love her fishing and I reckon she's going to turn into a class member of the club isn't it?

[00:15:51]I think she'll show a few of the boys up that's for sure. And there's old Kevin Hargreaves then you know tutor turned pupil turned tutor.

[00:16:01]>> [snorts] >> I don't even know if that's one of his nines or one of his eights but my god that boy has been catching fish. He's been doing really well particularly through April.

[00:16:09]He's he's a great ambassador for the club as well and can't leave without mentioning that picture that our resident videographer here Dave Tarrant took of Dolly with that tench. I mean that is a fabulous picture. Yeah well yeah if Dolly smiled a bit more it'd be even better but yeah it's yeah it's a cracking cracking picture that is. I mean it highlights the fact that it's so green that's what's nice about it.

[00:16:35]It's a beauty so you know well done Dave and obviously well done Andrew on that on that one. We're not actually going to give this one the prize Dave has decided on another picture but we are going to be using this one prominently in a future poster for Reading District cuz I mean that kind of sums up what Reading District is a part of what Reading District is about which is big waters big fish lovely lovely wild lovely wild anglers.

[00:17:00]Mirror mirror reflection on the water you got sunsets you got yeah it's everything. It's a cracker and done with an iPhone.

[00:17:07]Yeah the only thing is he didn't wear his hat and I I I. Yeah you can't tell Dolly what hat to wear.

[00:17:14]Right so fishing picture of the month for April who have you gone for?

[00:17:18]>> Well, I've gone for John Middleton with a PB tench from Flint again. Again, you know, that it really shows off the colors of the fish, you know, where you got the blue sky, blue blue water. I mean, water's not blue. We all know that. It's not really blue. It looks blue in there.

[00:17:35]Yeah, I mean, it's just it's just another sort of spring time capture and that epitomizes spring. Yeah. Well, congratulations, John. What's he got to do? He's got to get in contact via messenger or on our Facebook page, whichever, and what we'll do is we'll make sure your prize, courtesy of Rod Hutchinson Baits & Tackle and Bait-Tech is in the hat and of course you will get your RDNAA woolly hat.

[00:18:07]I've got the woolly hats now.

[00:18:09]Congratulations, John, and thanks for that, Dell. Right, I think we now move on to fish of the month. We had quite a lot of entries on your uh new wonderful website.

[00:18:20]>> [laughter] >> Um Yeah. Can I just make a really gentle appeal to people? It's fabulous to see the entries coming in. I moan when we don't have enough, but you know what? There are monsters swimming around in Reading District waters and your 6-lb carp in Wilmots ain't going to be winning fish of the month. Uh if it's a great picture, it might win picture of the month, uh but you know, we are awarding these to specimen fish or fish that are particularly notable for the water from which they're from. So, uh by all means keep the entries coming in, but bear in mind the bar is quite high with Reading District. We are a club that has some of the biggest fish in the country in our waters and that is reflected in the sort of fish that win these prizes, which is why I'm delighted to announce that for April for once, a dyed-in-the-wool carper has put in a uh prize. It's obviously a new member.

[00:19:10]Yeah, a 45-lb common from Pingewood. He didn't name the lake. We do give people the option not to name the lake, and it's a beautiful, beautiful fish that Bradley Hanson has caught. Then we got a couple of pictures of Bradley with it.

[00:19:24]Uh and congratulations, Bradley. You win a 50-pound Angling Direct voucher, which I'm sure you'll spend on boilies or something something carpy anyway. Uh and uh a lovely trophy. So, Or the other half of his trousers. Yeah, we buy you a full pair of trousers for 50 quid.

[00:19:40]Um [snorts] get in touch, mate, and uh I'll do the formal handover of the trophy and the uh uh uh and the tackle voucher. So, congratulations to everybody, and thanks very much for your entries. Keep them rolling in. I've already got some pretty special ones for May as well.

[00:19:56]>> Oh, May's been Yeah, cuz we're a little late, you know, we've we're halfway through May now. So, yeah, May's going to be a bumper month. Oh, yeah, there's just a some amazing fish caught. Right, we'd normally now delve go on to the Fortis prize Yeah, but Yeah, but but we um anyone that's seen this before will know that what we can do through Club Mate, we can filter down um to birth dates, and then I can filter them down to months, and then come up with a list of uh birthdays. But the powers that be have decided that data protection encumbers that. Um so, we've now lost the ability to do it.

[00:20:33]So, what we're going to do, we're going to postpone it this month cuz I only found this out about half an hour ago um lastminute.com.

[00:20:41]And so, we're going to postpone it for this month, and what we're going to do is we are going to compile a list of YouTube subscribers. There's around 1,800 at the moment. We'd like to boost that up. Um so, anyone that subscribes to our YouTube channel will be in with a chance of getting a free pair of sunglasses courtesy of Fortis, and they are nice sunglasses as well. They're were winning. So, and it's a click of a button and ring on a bell or something like that. I don't know the ins and outs of it, but [snorts] next month that's how we'll be going. We'll be going down the route of giving our prizes away to YouTube subscribers. It might not be a birthday.

[00:21:21]It might just be a random No, it'll just be a random selection from anyone that has that is subscribed to our channel.

[00:21:27]So, if you want to get yourself a free pair of glasses, make sure you subscribe. Okay, fair enough.

[00:21:34]Um thank you very much for that, Del. I think that probably concludes all the items we've had other than to hear from Jim on fishing prospects for the month of May and we're letting go a little bit of June, but not past June the 16th, yeah?

[00:21:50]Yeah. No no rivers. No rivers. No rivers. Mind you, he ain't I don't think he's Yeah, he has actually. He's been down a few, so he has got on a fair idea, but come next month he'll have a good idea cuz he'll be sick of the death of them.

[00:22:03]Of course he'll be counting them, won't he? He'll be counting them, yeah. Okay.

[00:22:06]I'm sure you'll [snorts] be encouraged again. Oh, of course. I always do.

[00:22:09]Right, you bugger off and we'll have Jim next.

[00:22:11]>> Yep.

[00:22:15]>> [music] >> Jim, before I bring you in, I just realized um I stumbled over my words last time. In my own defense, I have just come out of sedation in hospital, so good excuse.

[00:22:27]I'm sponsored by some kind of sedative at the moment.

[00:22:30]>> [snorts] >> Lovely lovely picture popped up again of uh Ava Holmes. She is Ava Holmes, not Ava McDonald's and uh yes, Ava Holmes will be a fabulous angler in the future, I bet. She certainly will, yeah. She's almost catching as many as her dad already. And probably more than her granddad. Yeah.

[00:22:48]Right, so it's been an interesting month for uh Tinca carp.

[00:22:53]>> Ooh, certainly has. Uh May we know has been spectacular. Um what are you reckoning uh May so far? What do you reckon is going to be happening for the rest of this month and into early June? Well, I reckon it's going to be a tench and a carp again. Um, lots of times I've been sort of walking around. I've given Flint, Anglefield, and Pinch a good mow recently.

[00:23:15]Um, I've been seeing a lot of wet mats around on the floor. The tench anglers are all happy. Um, certain days it's has been a bit of a struggle for the tench guys on the bigger pits, but there's been a few days where it's been really on and they've been almost clubbing them. So, um, plenty of doubles have been coming out I think in the last sort of week or so I've heard three, potentially four doubles coming out, which is great to see as well. So, for the guys out there targeting tench, keep at it. They've not spawned yet. There's good chance of a double figure to be had this month. And what about those lakes that are slow to warm up? I mean, you always reckon Motlands takes a while, don't you? Yeah, Motlands always does.

[00:23:52]Um, again, you've got the big lake next door, so that's feeding into Motlands, so that's keeping it as a bit of bit of chill on the water there. Slightly deeper as well, so it obviously takes a bit longer to warm up. But you places like Flint, Anglefield, they're the first to sort of kick into gear cuz you've sort of got average depths of sort of five, six foots in those, so they don't take long to warm up. But you think Motlands with this warm weather coming now? Oh, certainly will, yeah.

[00:24:13]This weekend that we've got with this warm weather, they'll certainly be starting to get on the feed over there.

[00:24:18]Um, and Motlands is a great place even if look, the tench aren't really on the feed there, get yourselves over there, stick a feeder rod out for the tench, and you can have a great day's rod fishing there. There's over the last couple of years there's some right stonking rudd in there, sort of eight ounce plus. So, yeah, the tench aren't always going to be on the feed, but if the tench aren't on the feed, don't ruin the day's fishing, take a float rod with you and have a good good day's sport, catch some rudd, some nice perch in Motlands as well.

[00:24:42]And what about those Scottish line bream? They they must be on the munch, aren't they? Yeah, yeah, I'm not seen too many go up on the Facebook page, but I'm sure there's a few guys have been going down there and catching a few. I know last month a chap went down and had a really good afternoon's fishing down there. Um, again, I always say it's a small lake, but make sure you have a look for the fish in there. Don't just turn yourself up plop in the first swim and expect to catch. Look for where the fish are bubbling and if you can be on the fish there, keep the feeder going in and you'll have a great day's fishing.

[00:25:09]So, do you think we're going to be seeing a 12-lb tench this year out our waters and a 60-lb carp? Oh, no. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. 11-2's the best I've heard on the tench. That was couple of days ago.

[00:25:22]I heard of it maybe caught it last weekend.

[00:25:26]60-lb carp?

[00:25:27]It is going to be very close to it, yeah. We've multiple of our waters have done 50-lb already this year.

[00:25:34]I just think we're probably a year away before we get quite to that stage where we see a 60, but plenty of 50-lb. I'll I'll be honest, I don't think there's a gravel pit we've got that hasn't got a fish over 50-lb or very close to it. So, for the carp anglers, there is plenty to go at.

[00:25:51]Well, on that note, Jim, thank you very much. Well, that's it for another month.

[00:25:55]I hope hope you enjoyed what we had to offer and all that remains is for me to wish you tight lines and some great sport out there. Have a good one.

[00:26:08]>> [music] [music]