Day 4 began with a slower than expected start, but after a good breakfast at camp, Chris and I headed south for lower Pocahontas County and the Elk River watershed. We had plans on fishing some tributaries to the Elk River then fishing the main Elk later that evening. Those plans changed quite a bit after talking to a good friend and finding out that the #18 sulphur spinners were not hatching during the evenings like I originally expected. No worries, though we had plenty of water to fish and made a decision to fish a tributary stream that I had been told was full of Brown Trout and Rainbow Trout. After spooking a thick water snake from his perch on a rock, we headed up stream for parts unknown. Chris and I did have a few missed hookups and we moved a nice fish, but no trout were landed from this stream, so I will not write this stream off yet, just have to visit it another day. As the day went on, we decided to head to the headwaters of the mainstem of the Elk River. We arrived at the parking lot and decided to eat a bite for lunch before making the 3 mile hike downstream. We were headed down river for a tributary that is not named on some maps, but has been rumored to have an extremely thriving population of wild Rainbow Trout. During the first mile of walking Chris and I either stepped over or dang near stepped on 5 different snakes. We couldnt positively ID any of the snakes, but then again we weren't really trying to stick around to find out either. After trekking through waist high vegetation, nettles, briers, etc., we finally located the mouth of the stream we were looking for. As soon as we started up into the mouth of the stream, we started prospecting pools and it didn't take long until we found out the rumors of wild Rainbow Trout to be true. This stream was extremely steep and loaded with plunge pools, pockets, and riffles. I honestly dont know how many little rainbows we caught, but as the daylight started to fade, we reached a stopping point and began the long hike back to the truck. Another day on another fine WV wild trout stream.
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