Roach?

[Pete Collins]

Sorry for the poor quality photo! Are these small fish roach? They seem to have some red on their fins.

They were in the river Misbourne at Old Amersham on Wednesday.

Thanks for your help.

Pete

[Kayleigh]

I think they may be Rudd

fish

[coasty]

I would say they are roach, The fins do not seem red enough for them to be rudd, Also there overall profile and colouration would suggest roach, and also importantly the fact they are in a river rather than still water would say roach rather than rudd,,,,,

Andy

[Kayleigh]

Originally Posted by coasty

I would say they are roach, The fins do not seem red enough for them to be rudd, Also there overall profile and colouration would suggest roach, and also importantly the fact they are in a river rather than still water would say roach rather than rudd,,,,,

Andy

OK I stand corrected

[Pete Collins]

Thank you both very much.

When I typed in the bit about red fins, I did suddenly wonder if they were Rudd! But I'd seen a photo of Roach in the gallery that looked similar, so I stuck with my first guess.

I was just impressed that the water was so clean and that the fish actually showed up in the photo! Actually I was quite pleased to see water there, as most times I've walked through Old Amersham the river's been dry.

[coasty]

Originally Posted by Kayleigh

OK I stand corrected

Only my opinion but very graciously put,,,,,

[fish]

could be a hybrid of the two,theyre notorious for it and the only way to tell for sure would be to count the scales on the lateral line.

and looking closer at the image ,the mouth is upward pointing which is predominantly a rudd feature.

[Pete Collins]

Thanks very much, fish!

Amazing what you can learn on WAB! I know very little about fish, although I did go fishing a few times when I was a boy (about the middle of the last century! )

The picture obviously isn't too good for identification purposes, so I'll just say they're roach, rudd or a hybrid of them. I was just interested as they obviously weren't Sticklebacks, and I was pleasantly surprised to see any fish at all as the river is often dry at that point.

Thanks again for everybody's comments,

Pete

[Lincs Yellowbelly]

Roach in my opinion

Roach/rudd hybids aren't that common in my experience, certainly not like Roach/Bream

[JAYS]

Very definitely roach. I was photographing some myself recently in a local pond. ( also ex super keen angler, saw thousands of them)

Roach-rudd hybrids, although fairly rare, can be locally common. I used to catch both rudd and roach-rudd hybrids in the Lake District. The hybrids outnumbered the pure rudd. Never caught a true roach in the water, but it was a big water, and they were probably elsewhere.

[Chris Hammond]

Look like Roach to me too, although the water looks more suited to dace and chub. It's not as likely that they'll be Roach/rudd hybrids in flowing water, as rudd are predominantly fish of still water. As I understand it, the quickest way to spot a non true roach is to look at the dorsal and pectoral fins. On a true roach (I think.) they are directly above and below one another. On hybrids they are often not. I believe the acid test would be a scale count.

[rpdoinMESatpompey]

im 99% sure i saw a number of small chub in the little missenden village pond, their red fins, long body and black tip tails made it clear they werent roach or rudd. also a large shoal of nice sized rudd at the end of the pond.

[Lincs Yellowbelly]

Chub aren't usually noticable by Red fins to be honest, you usually notice a black rim to the tail and the very large mouth. They are quite unusal in small ponds.

[JAYS]

Black tail, large mouth are indeed diagnostic. Orange pelvic fins may be noticeable. If in landlocked ponds there is the distinct possibility that they have been introduced there by anglers, and they will do quite well there, although their more natural habitat is the river.

[Lincs Yellowbelly]

We stocked a few Chub, they hardly get caught and are all still not much bigger than when stocked

[Pete Collins]

Originally Posted by rpdoinMESatpompey

im 99% sure i saw a number of small chub in the little missenden village pond, their red fins, long body and black tip tails made it clear they werent roach or rudd. also a large shoal of nice sized rudd at the end of the pond.

Hi rpdoinMESatpompey, welcome to WAB! (Catchy name, by the way! )

I've walked through Little Missenden several times, though I've not visited the pond. It's one of my favourite villages, and the church there is one of the most interesting I've ever visited.

(For those that don't know, Little Missenden is just a couple of miles along the valley of the river Misbourne from Old Amersham where I took the photo.)