WV - wild, wonderful, wet and relaxing

[rbphoto]

Over the last 3 years I have developed a great friendship with our CWI/welding instructor here at the office.  He is a 74 yr old Army SF Vietnam vet who was born in WV and raised mostly by his grandparents in coal country.  He loves the outdoors, hunting, shooting, fishing, family, country and more. 

His cousin back home in WV has been after him to come up and go trout fishing with him for some time, and finally convinced him he could learn to fly fish.

I got the pleasure of introducing him to fly casting.  This past weekend, we road-tripped past way too much prime trout water to go hit a couple of trout streams, meeting up with his cousin. 

I knew I was going to play guide more than fisherman for the weekend and figured I could relax and enjoy the time and make certain he caught a few fish. So I packed a few goodies:





That rot gut on the left was his contribution.  Closer look:



It came home with me with only a single dram having been poured.  It will make a good mixer.  I prefer that 1792 Full Proof, for certain.

It has rained a lot in WV this spring, and the forecast for the weekend really wasn't promising.  I was not surprised to arrive Friday around lunchtime to find the water looked like peanut butter. There was a stocker stream close by.  Earlier in May we missed an opportunity to get him on moving water to test his sea legs and feel a trout on the end of the line, so Friday afternoon was the chance before we started hiking.  It worked:





We decided we needed to do a little scouting and determine where our alternative fishing spots needed to be based on the forecast.  Some of those streams clear quickly, but others stay dirty for 24-36 hrs and there was no time for that kind of crap.  A nice evening drive discovered a good alternative, so we headed back to "camp" and watched the evening hatch.







The next morning we rose early and headed out.  Seemed like we made a good choice.  The water was clear-ish with good flow.







The scenery was beautiful.  Lots of flowers and lush growth.









Most of WV has been ecologically raped and pillaged, and the reminders remain.  This area was logged sometime back in the late 80's and there were several parallel railroad spurs from the logging carts that hauled out the timber.









It was nice to find that not everything got cut down and there are still some larger trees up in those hills.



More scenery:













Butterflies were as prolific as all the other bug life.

Red spotted purple:



Saw more of those than Eastern Tiger Swallowtails, but about five other species were sighted along with a few dragonflies. 

These little shucks are reminders of why we put beads on nymphs.



We turned over a few rocks and found a super abundance of insect life.  Baetis, stoneflies, caddis, isonychia, etc.  Adults were a little later coming off, but some very large stone flies were around as well as a few of these:





We saw brown drakes, sulphurs, BWO's, caddis and a whole bunch of other bugs coming off the water throughout the day, but very little dry fly action.  It was really surprising, but emergers, soft hackles and old school prince nymphs were the ticket.

The fishing wasn't stellar, but it was solid.











We all lost several, but the most frustrating for me was when I had just tied on a dry with an emerger BWO dropper, swapped rods with Bill so he could cast to a rising fish and tied on a soft hackle to the bend of a caddis he had on.  I made one cast, hooked a really nice fish, and his knot came undone. 

I felt so stupid for not checking that leader.  I just sat down on the bank and watched the guys fish some more.  That's when I found this really cool little succulent growing on the mossy root of a tree and wished I had a way to get some home for my wife.





Sunday was blown out again, so we spent the morning packing up and exploring some of the other areas around.  Finally got a small group picture and headed back South.



I'd like to fish WV more, but it will be for more than 2 days next time. 

[Woolly Bugger]

grand day(s) on the water with friends can't be beat..  -0-  -0-

super nice photos as usual 

[Yallerhammer]

Good stuff!

[Dougfish]

Nice, Rainman!
Sedum tectorum. You can pinch some in my garden. Or a nearby stream.