Gnats!
Of course there would be gnats.
It wasn’t even April, yet here they were; swarming around my head as I sat on my truck’s tailgate lacing up my wading boots before a hike into one of my go-to native brook trout streams.
Sometimes you have to take the bad with the good, and fortunately when you’re on an adventure in the amazing George Washington and Jefferson National Forest, there’s much more that’s good than bad.
The GW/Jeff, as we like to call it, is 1.8 million acres of outdoor mecca in Western Virginia (with a tiny bit across the border in West Virginia).
It’s a place with seemingly endless opportunities for hunting, hiking, biking, camping, birding and fishing.
So. Much. Fishing.
On this warmer-than-usual early spring day, the fishing happened in a tumbling mountain stream filled with tiny brook trout that for a couple of centuries have spurred the passion of anglers who have pursued them both for sustenance and, of late, for fun.
Beyond these small streams — actually, below them — there are larger rivers contained or bordered by the forest. Big, bold streams like the James and New with their ravenous smallmouth bass and elusive muskellunge.
The forest has dozens of bass- and bluegill-filled small ponds built for recreation; many contained within state parks. There are a couple of large reservoirs, including Lake Moomaw, where native chain pickerel prowl the weedy shallows and big brown and rainbow trout rule the depths. Below the dam that impounds Lake Moomaw, the Jackson River is a tailwater known for its wild browns and rainbows, as well as a complicated history.
Brook trout heaven
The brook trout is Virginia’s state fish. And if the GW/Jeff were to have its official fish, it would be the brookie.
The forest features thousands of miles of brook trout water, mostly high gradient small streams that start as trickles high atop ridges and gain volume as they tumble toward eventual confluences with larger tributaries and, finally, big rivers like the James, New and Shenandoah.
Some hold wild rainbows and browns, relics of long-ago stockings that, while well-intended at the time, their current presence creates competition challenges for stream natives. The stream I am fishing on this day is one of those. In its lower reaches wild rainbows have mostly displaced brookies.
The rainbows are fun to catch, but they aren’t natives. Finding natives requires a bit more effort, but a short hike from the end of the road can get fishermen into brook trout water in a few minutes.
How do you find brookie water in this vast and rugged landscape? It’s not hard. Pull out a paper map or dig into a fish mapping app like OnWater or TroutRoutes, find a blue line above 2,000 feet of elevation (give or take), and go. If you prefer an app, just make sure you download your map first because cell reception is hit and miss out there.
As you make your way up a mountain stream, most of them at least, you’ll probably see evidence that others have been there; a semi-maintained trail, maybe a primitive campsite with a rock fire ring, perhaps a fly dangling out of reach in a streamside tree.
It makes sense. The GW/Jeff is within an hour drive of the majority of Virginians who live west of Richmond. It’s only a couple hours from our nation’s capital on the banks of the Potomac River, another big waterway that benefits from water that starts high up in the forest.
Virginia’s larger rivers are mostly peripherally connected to the GW/Jeff, primarily as the rivers create borders of Forest Service ownership.
These can be small stretches, such as the several designated boat launch areas on the Jackson River tailwater. The forest touches the James and New in several areas, offering intrepid paddlers and opportunity for camping on overnight trips.
Conservation challenges
All is not perfect in the GW/Jeff, as would be expected for property that humans have utilized in one way or another for centuries.
Large-scale logging operations that helped power our nation’s growth were often undertaken without proper concern for the health of mountain streams. Clear-cutting to stream edges contributed to erosion problems and the loss of stream-shading trees.
Acid rain rendered some particularly vulnerable streams fishless a few decades ago.
And then there are the thousands of miles of roads within the forest. They are, to a large degree, critical arteries required for the ways we use the land. But many of those roads run adjacent to streams and contribute pollutants to otherwise pristine waters.
There are thousands of places where those roads cross streams, and many of those crossings have culverts that aren’t big enough to handle high flows that are becoming more frequent and severe as our climate changes, leading to road damage. Some culverts are perched above pools at their lower ends, segmenting habitat by restricting upstream movement of fish and other stream dwellers.
It seems there are constant threats of expanded industrial resource extraction and moves to reduce roadless area protections.
Nature, too, can be tough. Flood waters from Hurricane Helene devastated the Whitetop Laurel watershed near Damascus, Va., washing out dozens of historic bridges used for the Virginia Creeper Trail on a former rail bed. Record-breaking summer heat is pushing viable trout habitat ever higher up mountains.
These challenges and more are why there is a significant nexus between the GW/Jeff and all of TU’s designated Priority Waters in Virginia — the Potomac Headwaters, the Blue Ridge, the James/Shenandoah headwaters and the Grayson Highlands.
Reason for optimism
Thanks in large part to the Clean Air Act and other protections, acid rain is largely a thing of the past, though long-ago acid deposited in soils still impacts water chemistry in some streams. These forests have matured streams once again and are shaded by towering oaks, hickories and poplars.
TU has worked closely with the Forest Service and other partners on dozens of culvert replacement projects across the GW/Jeff, reconnecting habitat.
Our members and supporters are vocal in their advocacy for protections for these lands, our lands.
And it can take just a little moment to crystalize why it’s so important.
A moment like when a 5-inch-long brook trout, its flanks dappled in purple and pink and yellow, rises in a flash to snatch a tiny Parachute Adams fly. The fish is too small to put up much of a fight against a modern fly rod, but its kind has been fighting for survival in these mountains for millennia.
And, so, we fight for them.
Fishing sidebar
Brook trout are the stars of the high mountain streams in the George Washington and Jefferson National Forest.
They are generally not sophisticated, selective trout. If you get a little dry fly into a pool without too much of a disturbance and can manage a short drag-free drift — sometimes no small feat in the swirling micro currents — that fly will elicit a strike more times than not.
Perhaps the most important characteristic of an effective dry fly is one that you can actually see. Good luck following that drab, size 18 Elk Hair Caddis in a boisterous plunge pool after sunset. Instead, I usually stick with a Parachute Adams, usually size 18, though you can get away with a 16 if a stream has bigger-than-average brookies.
Some mountain stream aficionados swear by short rods, but I like something with a little length. My current go-to is a few-years-old 7-foot 9-inch Sage LL 3-weight. It’s short enough for actual casts in tight quarters, but long enough for roll casting and even dapping when necessary. It’s really too stout for tiny brookies, but I’ve appreciated that backbone when I’ve tangled with one of those rare 15-inch browns that you’ll encounter once in a while.