Not This Time....Smoky Mountain Revenge

If you look back to my Easter weekend adventure in the Smokies, my son and I were shut out due to high flows.

Shutout in the Smokies Report

Fast-forward to November and forecasts of unseasonably high 70-degree temperatures. I also wanted to see how long the drive would be from my new location, due south on I-75, to The Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

As with my Easter trip, I was threatened by high flows when Tropical Storm Ida blew through the area. The original plan was to fish Saturday and Sunday but high flows pushed it back by a day.

The forecast held up and the waters receded and I made the trip. I left the (current) house at 4:30 AM and I was on the Chimney Tops trailhead by 11:00 AM. A short mile hike, straight up, and I was rigging up to jump into the upper stretches of Road Prong. I was also without waders in mid-November!

I started out with the rig that I finished up with the last time I was on the water, a large stimulator with a large tungsten hare's ear nymph. I immediately moved fish but I was unable hook up. When I finally did hook up, I sent the first brookie into the pool below me.

I moved multiple fish without bringing one to hand as I slowly moved upstream in some of the most extreme fishing I have done in a long while. I was flying solo and I was very careful on foot placement and securing my footing before moving on.

This is the bridge where I "jumped in" and you can see that traversing this stream was difficult at best.

I tried multiple patterns as I moved upstream and moved a few fish, but landed none. When I finally arrived at a set of cascades I would choose not to attempt (solo), I stopped for lunch.

As I finished my lunch I noticed a few small mayflies flying about so before I put my pack back on I tied on an 18 parachute BWO. Tight against a rock in the first pool, fishing back downstream, I picked up this amazing specimen.

Dry flies and wet wading in November! Does it get any better than this?

Now I knew what they wanted and where they were holding...game on!

Eventually the BWO pattern slowed, so I switched to a black EHC - I saw a few little black stones flying around too. The little black stones typically don't produce good dry fly fishing, so it may have been the caddis profile.

Regardless, they liked it!

It's also a good sign to see a few of these little guys:

After a long car ride, a few hours of scrambling, and the sun setting out of the deep canyon I decided to call it a day. After all I still had to find a hotel room, not that difficult in the off-season of Gatlinburg. I found a room with cable TV and wi-fi for $28 (including tax) - we paid that for a tent site earlier in the year.

The next morning I took my time getting moving, there was still frost on my vehicle front glass at 9:00 AM. My plan was to head to the Middle Prong of the Little Pigeon River above Ramsey Prong. This section of stream was closed until 2005 as part of the 25-year brook trout population study.

I made the short uphill, 1.5-mile trek to the mouth of Ramsey. Again, with forecasts of 70 degrees I would be wet wading again.

This section of stream is not as rugged as the prior day, but the boulders are much larger and the pools are much deeper.

I had to wade across Ramsey to get on upstream on the Middle Prong, so as I did I dapped this little guy from a nice plunge pool on Ramsey. I always like to begin my prospecting with a small, olive woolybugger.

I will keep Ramsey on my list to revisit as it had several nice plunge pools I could see as I crossed the lower end.

I eventually made it above Ramsey on MPLP, but those rhododendron thickets were a bear to weave through with a fly rod!

I continued to dredge the bottom with the small, olive woolybugger and it continued to produce.

I could feel the air temperature increasing and, in my mind, that means only one thing: dry flies.

I switched over to the black EHC that produced so well the day before, with an 18 BHPT dropper. The fish didn't immediately take notice of the dry, but they sure noticed the little dropper - my first rainbow of the trip.

As with the day before, it's always good to see these guys!

When they started keying on the dry, I removed the dropper and it was pure dry fly action - in November! Pitching that little black caddis up tight against the rocks produced some very nice fish - both rainbows and brookies.

I continued to pick up a good mix of bows and brookies, but as it neared 1:00 I made the difficult decision to call it a day. I had a downstream scramble, a short hike, and a long drive ahead of me.

As I made it to the mouth of Ramsey, I made a few more casts at the wonderful pool at the mouth of Ramsey. It produced a fish, the largest of the trip, and a great fish to end the day.

When I finally stepped back on the trail, there was not much left of that little, black caddis. The Middle Prong of the Little Pigeon produced several more fish than Road Prong, but that didn't matter - revenge on the Smokies had been served.

Also, I found it to be a little over four hours from the Ramsey Cascade trailhead to my "new" home in Florence, Kentucky. I can see more Smoky Mountain searching for native salmonids in the future, and....

You gotta love wet wading and dry flies in mid-November!

Chris

A Wonderful Fall Weekend in WV - 2009

It's a month since this trip, but I have fully transferred to the Cincinnati area and things have been a little hectic.

A year ago I started this blog with the same activities that took place this weekend - the Blennerhassett TU chapter fingerling stocking.

This would be a little bit more of an adventure than the previous year. The first day would be a complete hike through of the Middle Fork of the Williams watershed, from the Scenic Highway to the mouth on Williams River Road. I would make this hike with the head of the West Virginia limestone fines program and the plan was to take water samples at various points throughout the watershed.

This is the stream from a June report when over fifty volunteers moved over seven tons of limestone fines, one five-gallon bucket at a time.

The hike was about ten miles in length and was some of the most beautiful water I have been on anywhere in West Virginia. When the brookies return to this water, this will be another WV gem!

It was also good to see limestone fines sand dumped in the culverts on the Scenic Highway has moved more than a mile into the watershed.

Back to the stream and the beautiful water, the first stream crossing on the trail:

The recent rains had the water up and a little off-color, not "mud" off-color but "tea-stained" off-color. The rains also made the stream crossing a little difficult for someone not wearing wading shoes (not me).

About halfway through the watershed we came to one of the most interestingly named streams anywhere!

Hell For Certain Branch dumps into the Middle Fork of the Williams with a magnificent plunge.

From Hell for Certain Branch it was on downstream to Beechy Run, which also dumps into the Middle Fork with a spectacular set of falls.

From the mouth of Beechy, it was another short mile to the lower trailhead for a total of over six hours on the trail.

I stopped to fish a new brookie stream on the way back across the Scenic Highway, but the recent rains had the little stream nearly unfishable and I was beat from the Middle Fork hike.

The plans for the remainder of the weekend were to hang out at the Thornwood Science Camp with fellow chapter members and our annual fingerling stocking on the headwaters of the West Fork of the Greenbrier.

My journey to Thornwood would take me through Cass and Greenbank - Greenbank has a serious problem with their deer herd. Just before crossing the East Fork of the Greenbrier to camp I had a black bear run across the road in front of me. This is the second black bear of the season for me and that makes the total personal black bear sightings in West Virginia three. I don't have a clue how many days I've spent in the West Virginia backcountry and I've only seen three bear.

At camp I was expecting a full cabin (ten bunks), but we ended up with a total of three. It may have been the weather forecast, which called for snow in the higher elevations.

The forecast turned out to be accurate as we woke to a skiff of snow. As we traveled across Middle Mountain to the West Fork, it was more than a skiff. This is October 17!

As with previous years, we would meet at Wildell - the site of an early 20th century logging community....110 million board feet!!

From the rail trail you could see the distinct snow line.

Considering the weather we had a good turnout, including a couple of new guys and a couple of young children. It's always great to see the young ones getting involved in conservation, even though they don't understand the reason why we do what we do, it's good to see the outdoors.

Following the stocking we had a few hours to explore some new water with an old friend. I haven't fished with him since this stocking last year. We would be fishing another new limestone fines stream that I was made aware of the day before.

I hadn't had on waders since March but near freezing temps and a rain/snow mixture forced my hand. As much as I hate to admit it, I had to wear waders in October!

We fished for about an hour, mixing up the flies before I finally figured out what they wanted. Going back to an outing on the main branch of this watershed earlier this year, I tied on the biggest dry fly in my box and dropped off the biggest tungsten beadhead nymph behind it....bingo!

It's always good to see a few of these guys in a stream (up until the day before) I thought was "dead".

Out of the same run came the largest fish of the day, on the dry and in beautiful spawning attire.

I picked up a few more on the dry dropper setup, but with an hour drive back to camp and a forecast for more snow we called in an early day - almost.

We stopped along the road to show my friend a stream I had fished earlier this year - also the last stream I had waders on this year (in March). We stopped quickly just to check out a couple of large pools. I gave my friend first shot but when he struck out I picked up this guy on the dropper. Notice how dark the background is, as it was the last minutes of daylight.

Following a long day, it was an early night with the plans for the last day still up in the air - to hike or fish?

When I woke, there was another layer of snow on the ground so as I pulled out on the road I had still not made up my mind what I would do. One quick stop on another new stream my partner had fished on Friday. I didn't even put on my gear, just grabbed a rod and stepped off the gravel road to a culvert hole and I added another new stream to my brookie list.

From this small trib it was back to the hardtop for the short drive along North Fork Mountain to the Mouth of Seneca. As I traveled along NFM I noticed the trees were still in their beautiful fall colors. At this point I made up my mind - I was headed back to Chimney Rock!

I noticed, as I neared the trailhead, another distinct snow line on the mountain.

When I hike to Chimney Rock in September I took the North Fork Mountain Trail to the top. This time I thought I would cut some distance and drive on up the mountain to Landis Trail.

What I found out is that although the Landis Trail is shorter, there is only one switchback - straight up, all the way to the top!

I found the snow line on the way up too:

Once to the top from the Landis Trail, I found myself a little south of the Chimney Rock. I also discovered that snow-covered rhododendron and spike trails to overlooks are not a good combination as I found myself backtracking multiple times. Regardless of being turned around multiple times and being soaked clear through from the snow-covered jungle, the views were absolutely amazing.


This was my last shot before heading down off the mountain. It is the storm coming across the top of Dolly Sods Wilderness Area.

Regardless of the weather it was a wonderful day to hike. What day isn't? It was another wonderful fall (or winter?) weekend in West Virginia, and I also added two more brookie streams to my personal list - although I fished four new streams.

I had a friend tell me that now that I'm an "Ohisian", I have to get my money's worth on my trips back to West Virginia...mission accomplished!

Chris

Thoughts of Jimmy V

Most of my journeys typically have two goals:

1) Explore blue lines in search of brook trout.

2) Mental cleansing - a requirement for everybody from time to time.

It's amazing how all worries in life tend to disappear when you are in a beautiful environment with the sound of running water.

This particular weekend was no different, as my mind was spinning with thoughts of leaving my home state of West Virginia.

On the way home I reflected on the weekend and all I could think of was Jimmy V's 1993 Espy speech. To begin with, I am a huge fan of motivational speakers and this particular speech was THE best I have ever had the fortune to see (live).

Jimmy V 1993 Espy Speech

One of the points I always think of from this is his three items to a full life, which is a daily requirement to spend time in laughter, thought, and emotions moved to tears....back to the report.

This weekend was planned around the fall State Council meeting for West Virginia Chapter of Trout Unlimited. The plan was to begin Friday with a hike to Chimney Tops on North Fork Mountain. Saturday would be a backpack stocking followed by State Council and Sunday would be a quick trip to another new brookie stream on the way home.

Chimney Tops is a rock formation I saw from the Dolly Sods Wilderness overlook earlier this summer. If you look to the extreme left of the higher rock formation, that would be Chimney Tops.

This hike would be about 1.5 mile in length (uphill the entire length), it would be with one of my usual fishing partners, and it would include a new friend - a man that has been running around Dolly Sods Wilderness area for over 50 years.

It was a beautiful late-summer day, perfect weather for a hike.

The hike up was uneventful and no matter how much description I put into it, it will never come close to describing what it was actually like up there. I won't try to describe it, I'll let the photos do that and remember: photos are one-dimensional.


There are not many places in West Virginia where you have a full 360-degree view.

While we were on top I took time to relax and think. I couldn't help but think this would be the one and only time I would make this journey. The view itself was enough to move you but the thoughts of it being the last time I would see it put a lump in my throat. This is the point where I started to think of Jimmy V.

I had to put those thoughts behind me, as it was time to make the hike back down to the trailhead. On the way down we stopped again to check out the views of the North Fork of the South Branch of the Potomac (that's a mouthful) valley. For perspective, check out the riverside cabins, in the background left, as my new friend took a break.

Once back at the vehicle it was time to temporarily part ways. We would all meet back up at the 4H camp at Thornwood and the location of our State Council meeting.

As I got near camp I stopped by a little stream that followed the road near camp. This is a stream I have driven past multiple times but had never taken the time to prospect it for brook trout.

The water was a little low but it was much better than it had been, this time of year, the last couple of years.

The first hole I fished was a culvert hole that failed to produce. I walked through the culvert and started fish the small pocket water and this was the first brook trout of the weekend - small but always a good sign.

I picked up a few more fish as I moved up stream; including this male that was starting his fall transition. He had magnificent colors and was beginning to form a nice kype and hump on his back.

On upstream I ran into a couple of decent pools, the first was protected by a large downfall. This downfall also protected the very large inhabitant of that pool, an easy 12"+ brook trout. I ended up spooking that large specimen as I tried to get a fly to the water. You'll have that from time to time. That's probably how that fish got that large - sometimes it's nice to know those guys are out there.

The next large pool had a large log across the head, which created a very nice pool. I could see something making wakes in the pool so I came in low and limited my back casts. I made several nice presentations in the pool and was about ready to give up when this girl finely cooperated.

Excuse the poor quality of the photo but you can easily see this is a fish in the 8"-10" range, a trophy anywhere.

This was a great way to end a wonderful day, so it was time to pack it in and head for camp.

The rest of the evening was nice as well: great food, a nice campfire with great company and many stories and a lot of laughter. Day one was full: laughter, thought, and emotion.

The next day would be a full one. The day started with a backpack/mule stocking in the Laurel Fork Wilderness area. This is the same stream I fished two weeks earlier with very little success. I don't think the water quality is good enough to support a thriving population of trout so it is supplemented yearly with this effort.

With the stream contained almost entirely within designated wilderness area, this is the only means to get fish stocked. Mules are used to carry fish into the northern Laurel Fork Wilderness Area.

Once the mules were packed, the backpackers (including me) went to the top of Middle Mountain where we would take three different routes off the mountain. Once you find the stream at the bottom, you pick up the Laurel Fork trail, and hoof it back to the campground.

I had to make quick time so I opted for the first trail. Once down to the stream it was time to place these brown trout fingerlings into their new homes. Also, it was nice to see much better water flows than I have seen during this stocking in years past.

I found a nice stretch of water to place my pack full of fish. Several brown trout fingerlings now call this pool home.

I now had 45 minutes to get back to camp for a committee meeting; prior to the State Council meeting and the drive itself was 30+ itself. I through my backpack back on and made the decision the only way to make it on time was RUN.

I found out I'm out of shape but I was still able to run the mile or so of trail back to the campground with only a couple of walking breaks. I'm just glad I have restarted my regular basketball schedule so I can get some routine cardio back in my life.

I was able to make it out and back to camp in time for the meeting, although I sweated so bad I could smell myself - never a good sign. I did, however make one quick stop at the Laurel Fork overlook. What a beautiful day!

I think one of the highlights of Council was the recognition of two DNR law enforcement officers who made an arrest earlier this year that was one for any brookie lover's heart. They arrested three individuals with 61 brook trout over their limit, and some of those fish were very nice. These guys are spread pretty thin and I don't think they get the recognition they are due.

After the meeting it was another nice meal followed by another evening with good friends and good stories. I loved the stories of the former Council chair. He grew up in Montana and his family has gathered every year on the Gallatin for over 60 years. I thought to myself: when I am his age I hope I have stories of tradition like he has.

It was a long day and an early exit to bed.

The next day would consist of breakfast before goodbyes and a quick stop at another new stream.

Phil has been teasing me with this stream for almost a year, and he had fished it the day before, so I bit the bullet and made the 10-mile detour to this stream. It only took one wrong turn to find this stream. When I finally found the stream I also found the best water levels and flows I had seen in a couple of months.

Why is it the first fish of the day is always the smallest?

For the next two hours I caught several fish, nothing with impressive size but plenty of 6" brookies. I probably would have caught more but the light was just in between where it was too bright to be able to see my 18 EHC and not bright enough to wear my polarized sunglasses. A good outing nonetheless.

With a three-hour drive ahead of me I made a quick day of it on the water. I added another blue line to the personal list.

Before heading home I made one more stop, with the thought: "would this be my last visit here as well?"

I stopped at Greenbank National Radio Astronomy Observatory. It was still a bit early to catch the fall colors and the views of Bald Knob were hidden by the early morning fog and overcast skies.

After my final stop of the day it was back over Cheat Mountain. As I crested Cheat Mountain the thoughts haunted me again, as they had done all weekend. Multiple times that weekend, as I rounded many turns, as I crested several mountains, as I passed several incredible vistas, I thought to myself: will this be the last time?

As I swallowed the lumps in my throat on multiple occasions that weekend I thought of Jimmy V. I spent many a moment that weekend deep in thought, I fought back the associated emotions, and as long as I have my friends I will always have laughter....it was a full weekend!

Chris

It's Not Always Roses

...and such is the life of an explorer.

While most of my brook trout exploration journeys turn up roses, sometimes they turn up very little at all.

This Labor Day adventure was a trip into the extreme headwaters of the Laurel Fork South Wilderness Area. The South Laurel Fork Wilderness is the location of the wreckage I stumbled upon while bushwhacking to the stream during a backpack fingerling stocking.

I would be traveling with my fishing partner from the 2008 Colorado Cuttslam, Phil Smith.

The hike started with a 1.6-mile hike down Camp Five Mile Trail to Laurel Fork, where we would join the Laurel Fork Trail and hike downstream to the first feeder stream. It sure didn't seem like 1.6 miles, I usually check the watch for timing but not this time. We made it to the first feeder in what seemed like thirty minutes but the journey was over two miles.

We quickly rigged up and began prospecting this nice looking meadow stream. I hooked up in the very first pool - a beautiful 2" dace! As we fished upstream I had multiple hook-ups, and all were dace. There may be brookies in the extreme headwaters of this trib, but there was nothing but silt and dace in the lower stretch. We did not even spook a brook trout.

With things not looking too promising, we turned and headed back to Laurel Fork. Once returning to Laurel we made the decision to hike further downstream in search of more promising water.

Another mile or so downstream, the stream structure did not change so we jumped in. Phil headed upstream while I went down. I spooked something in the very first pocket and missed one with a downstream drift to a root ball. I find fishing top water with a downstream drift difficult to produce a hook up. The root ball was the beginning of the remnants of an old beaver pond. The old beaver pond did not produce any more action so I turned to catch Phil.

I caught Phil just in time to see him catch a nice 10" brookie. A beautiful specimen from a very small eddy.

Little did we know that would be the only decent (and nearly only brookie, period) out of the main Laurel.

We fished good run after good run and good pool after good pool, with only several more dace brought to hand. We did find, however, a couple of clues as to the lack of brook trout in the main Laurel:

We found multiple orange seeps:

I do not claim to be any type of expert on the history of mining in West Virginia, but this type of seep is usually associated with mining. I am not aware of any mining in this area but if this is the result of mining there will be no remediation. This is the downfall of Wilderness Area designation.

Another possible (but not likely) cause for the lack of brook trout would be this happy couple:

The first thing that caught my eye was the amount of red on the larger brown. I thought we had just spotted the largest brook trout Phil and had ever seen. We gave it the old college try but he wanted nothing we had to offer. After resting the pool while we had lunch, Phil gave it another shot while I hid above the pool. That's when I noticed it wasn't a brook but a brown trout in the 14"-16" class, obviously a holdover from the annual backpack fingerling stockings.

I don't feel the presence of the browns is the reason for the lack of brookies, as I've caught browns and brookies in the same small stream in eight different streams in West Virginia. They are an invasive species but they cannot wipe out an entire population of brookies - besides they had plenty of dace in that stream to keep them fat and happy.

With hopes dashed, we decided to call it a day on Laurel and head for the trail.

Just before we hit the trail to the vehicle I "dapped" my fly at another root ball and the brook trout skunk was gone.

One brook trout twenty yards from the downstream mouth of another brook trout feeder stream would not cause me to classify this section of Laurel as brookie habitat. This section of the Laurel Fork Wilderness is very beautiful but it obviously has its issues.

I have never been to the Pacific northwest, but I would imagine it would look a lot like this area. This area had beautiful sections of conifers and ferns, with some ferns up to four feet tall.

We had spooked a brookie in the trailside feeder stream on the way in; so on the way out I hit a couple of pockets. It took no time to produce:

Unfortunately, when things go bad even the brook trout photos turn out poorly.

Phil's GPS indicated a travel distance of seven miles, that would 2.33 miles per brook trout. That would also probably be about ten dace per mile.

We tried one more stream before heading for home, the Little River of the West Fork of the Greenbrier. It was another beautiful low gradient stream, but other than the fish I missed at the first hole, I saw only one other trout. Again, a beautiful section of stream but not very productive this day.

It may have been the fishermen, but when you are exploring new water you can't always be successful...c'est la vie.

Chris

The Last Blast of Summer

With three days left in my kids' summer break and my daughter five hours away at a camp for Chron's Disease patients, my son and I decided to travel our way across the state. The plan was to take a couple of days and explore some new territory in the state and end eventually up much closer to where I needed to pick up my daughter.

The first stop would be my son's first visit to Dolly Sods Wilderness Area and the first destination within the sods was the North Fork Mountain overlook. The August haze and overcast skies made for very poor visibility.

After setting up camp in Red Creek campground and having a couple of hot dogs cooked over the Coleman stove, we were off for a quick hike. The hike I planned was to a rock formation I spotted a month earlier when I hiked to the Lion's Head formation. You can see the rock formation in the distance, directly across Red Creek valley from Lion's Head in this photo from my July hike.

It was a late start (6:20 PM) but the hike was ~3 miles total - out the Wildlife trail to Rohrbaugh trail, to the overlook and back. Just in case we didn't make it out before dark, we each loaded up headlamps and I carried a larger Maglite in my pack.

This would be Ross' first hike into the sods and he wanted to be prepared: hydration bladder, fanny pack, walking stick (a souvenir from the Smokies), binoculars, head band, and three lights.

We didn't make very good time on the way in, lots of question to answer! What's this? What's that? Are we almost there?

It took almost 90 minutes to travel the first 1.5 miles to the overlook. Ross broke out the binoculars to check out the Lion's Head.

Again, the haze and overcast skies made the view of Lion's Head pretty poor, but we posed for father/son photo regardless.

With about an hour left before dark, we headed back for the trailhead. In order to make better time, I ended up with the walking stick and the fanny pack. We didn't make it out before it got dark in the dense cover and we put the lights to good use. We made much better time on the way out, covering the 1.5 miles in almost an hour.

Once back at camp, we had a nice (and quick) campfire before hitting the sack.

I woke Ross up well before daylight, in order for him to see his first (?) sunrise. We hiked out on the North Fork Mountain overlook in the pitch dark. Unfortunately, as the sun started to rise, I found we were in the wrong location to get a good view of the sunrise. We changed location and we were able to watch a very nice sunrise.

Following the sunrise and a quick jaunt around Bear Rocks, it was back to pack up camp and head for our next destination. Following an unplanned tour of the back roads of Hardy & Hampshire counties, I finally located the not so welled marked wildlife management area.

After setting up camp again, we went exploring for the road that would take us to the stream I planned to check out for brookies. The topo map showed a road that would take us fairly close to the stream - unfortunately the map did not match reality.

We found a trail that would take us to the stream and made a quick hike down the very steep terrain. I marked the top and bottom points of the trail on the GPS, because there were no trail markers or visible landmarks.

When we made it to the stream, I was disappointed at the low water levels. Apparently that area ha not received the August rain many parts of the state have seen. We immediately noticed many small fish darting about and we spooked a couple of brookies in the first pool. This would be another new stream on my list this year and it is probably the lowest brookie stream I have ever fished at just over 1,400 feet.

We traveled downstream where I hooked but lost a couple of brookies. Once we made it back to our starting point I was able to land the first brookie of the day.

We also discovered what the numerous small fish were. Apparently the brookie YOY are doing very well.

We fished a short distance upstream from the trail, picking up the occasional brookie that we didn't spook.

Following this last and largest fish of the day, we decided to head back out and up the mountain. On the way back to the base of the trail we flushed a woodcock, followed him to where he landed, and flushed him again so Ross could get a quick look at him - his first woodcock.

The hike out was brutally steep, but Ross pushed onward and upward like a trooper. When the GPS displayed the halfway point, Ross decided it was time for a break. This nice, soft patch of moss made a great resting area.

Once the GPS indicated 200 yards remaining, he decided he wanted to race to the top. Ross passed me but when he stopped to catch his breath, I passed him and I reminded him of the tale of the tortoise and the hair. The tortoise won this race to the top but I was more than impressed him his stamina and determination.

Once we got to the trailhead I realized how steep the incline was - we gained 600 feet of elevation in the half-mile.

We returned to camp to recover and grab a bite to eat - Spaghetti O's and peanut butter crackers. I was ready to rest but Ross was ready to fish, although he wasn't interested in hiking back down to the brookie stream. I knew the South Branch of the Potomac was nearby and this meant smallmouth. The only issue was I didn't have anything bigger than a 2wt.

We made the venture over the mountain and drove several miles upstream to find public access. I strung up the two weight and tied on a small hopper pattern - I didn't have a clue what to expect.

I have never been on the South Branch this low and the stream was incredible.

The water was crystal-clear and it was easy to see there were smallmouth everywhere. The question was: would they take a hopper pattern?

The answer was YES!

Ross started out wading in his shirt and sandals but decided the water felt too good to not swim, so he ended up in shorts only.

The little 10"-12" smallmouth, they were plentiful! Landing them on a 2 wt was a lot of fun too!


We finally called it a day on the water and a grand day it was - brookies in the morning and smallmouth in the evening. To top it off we saw Ross' first black bear as we were driving back up the mountain to camp.

We had a nice evening around the campfire and then to bed shortly after dark. We woke the next morning to the sound of a whippoorwill very near the tent. I hadn't heard that sound in over twenty years.

Before we broke camp we decided we had one last hike in us. We planned to hike beyond the locked gates to the fire tower on the top of the mountain. I tried to get Ross to put on shoes for the easy road hike, but he decided he was going to hike in his slippers.

We made the 2+ mile uphill (1,000 feet gain) hike in 90 minutes. We climbed several flights of the tower but hornet's nests and a lack of railing caused dad to stop the climb - Ross was ready to go to the top.

On the way back to the vehicle we spotted one of the largest black bear tracks I have ever seen.

We made it up and back in 2.5 hours and Ross again made the entire hike without a single complaint - just many more questions.

I think he enjoyed his last blast of summer: first trip to Dolly Sods, brook trout, first smallmouth, first woodcock, first black bear, first whippoorwill, and he traveled through 15 different West Virginia counties.

Chris

Wild Trout Symposium - Wild Trout X

"Conserving Wild Trout"

September 28-30th 2010

Holiday Inn, West Yellowstone, MT

Our Mission is to provide a forum for professional wild trout biologists and fishery conservationists to interact, to get to know each other in an informal setting, and to be exposed to the latest wild trout status, technology, and philosophy. These conferences equip participants to better preserve and restore this magnificent but declining resource.

WWW.WILDTROUTSYMPOSIUM.COM

Originated in 1974, this symposium offers exposure to the latest information on status, science, technology, philosophy, and preservation of cold-water wild-salmonid, in an international forum for professional wild trout biologists and fishery advocates. The primary cosponsors of this event include: the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the USDA Forest Service, the Trout and Salmon Foundation, the Federation of Fly Fishers, and Trout Unlimited.

New Native Trout Forum

This entry is to announce the development of a new native trout network/forum. This site is the brainchild of Anders Halverson from Boulder, Colorado. The site also has significant input from fellow native trout enthusiasts from Scott Carles (Cutthroat Stalker) from Mendon, Utah; Gary Marston (gigharborflyfisher) from Gig Harbor, Washington; and Dave Balducci (DaveB) from San Francisco, California.

These guys all reside on the west side of the Mississippi, but that doesn't make them bad people. In fact, the "life list" these guys have compiled is quite impressive! Some have over 20 native species all caught in their native watersheds - including one species, the Alvord Cutthroat, which is considered to be extinct by Dr. Robert Behnke. The jury is still out on that one.

If your interested in educating yourself or locating native species, go to The Angler's Life List & Native Fish Network.

You can find the link on the border to the right. You can also find the links to these fellow native trout aficionados' blogs in My Blog List, also in the border to the right.

Thanks,

Chris