The small sign reads “Northwater Creek” but fails to mention it’s 1,000 feet straight down.

Or maybe 1,500, or even the 3,000 that Chris Hunt swears is true after making the long hike out.

Nor is there is mention of fresh green cow poop hidden along a trail snaking through thickets of brambles and stinging nettles, of willows woven together tighter than 600-count sheets and the unremitting stares of thousands of fresh-shorn woolies, as if we were to blame for their semi-nakedness.

Excuse me, Bruce, but aren’t sheep born to be shorn?

And what about the mountain lion that showed up during a trip last summer on the Roan Plateau but was a no-show this time around? Maybe he, like the black bear that also entertained a crew of us last time, simply decided there are better things to do than hang out for a bunch of guys with trout on their minds.

You must have trout on your mind when you stand on the edge of a shale cliff diving off the Roan Plateau, eating without argument a plastic-wrapped convenience store sandwich while pointing at a strip of dark green far below as if it were the Holy Land.

Corey Fisher directs from above the casting of Kirk Deeter as the two fish the East Middle Fork of Parachute Creek on the Roan Plateau. Photo by Dave Buchanan.

But describing these fish as “trout” is like saying Roger Federer can play tennis.

These simply aren’t trout but rather Colorado River cutthroat trout, one of the state’s three existing native trout and special even beyond that.

“You figure this trout has been isolated up here for thousands of years and there’s no question it’s adapted to some unique environmental conditions, including higher water temperatures that would kill other trout,” said Corey Fisher, 30 minutes later as he quickly pulled a barbless fly from the jaw of a brightly colored 5-inch trout. “If these fish were lost, we’d lose genetics that took eons to develop.”

Which is one reason Fisher, energy field coordinator for the conservation group Trout Unlimited, and Hunt, with that group’s Sportsmen Conservation Project, talked two writers into clambering down a sage-covered cliffside into a jungle of riparian growth fed by Trapper and Northwater creeks that come together to form the East Middle Fork of Parachute Creek.

Neither of the tributaries would span the desk from which I am presently writing, but at least there’s water in those creeks. That wasn’t always true a few years ago as western Colorado wrestled with a tight-fisted drought.

Back then, all those willows now head-high to Yao Ming, many hand-planted by volunteers from the Grand Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited, were barely surviving.

And if a willow can’t survive, you can bet a fish will struggle, too.

“But that’s the beauty of these fish,” Hunt said, crouching his 6-foot 5-inch frame close to the creek, releasing a cutthroat of about 11-inches, a Moby Dick compared to the Nemo-sized creek. “They’ve somehow been able to adapt to those conditions and when the water comes back, so do they.”

The cool, wet spring that gave added life to these blue-line streams also apparently prolonged the spawning season, and we saw several pairs of cutthroats displaying the aggressive behavior associated with spawning fish.

However, we hadn’t clambered down this brush-wracked gully just to peer into the bedroom habits of small fish.

The trek was a reminder that this small population of native trout face other threats, perhaps more-serious than long-term drought or cattle trudging through their bedrooms.

Energy development on the top of the plateau promises to disrupt the environment these fish need to survive, although the extent of those impacts is something only the future will reveal.

Energy companies aren’t happy with some regulations aimed at protecting wildlife and habitat, and who can blame them. Theirs is a risky business, made even more so by the glut of natural gas and competition from vast amounts of imported liquefied natural gas.

Trout Unlimited is waiting for a ruling on a lawsuit that would overturn some energy leases and allow time to develop stronger protection for fish and wildlife.

As exploration and development moves across the plateau, from west to east, from private land to these islands of public, the possibility increases of an accident wiping out an entire stream’s population of rare trout.

“One major spill could destroy 10,000 years of trout genetics,” said Fisher. “We’re hoping to have enough time to strengthen the protection and lessen the impact when they do start drilling.”

Meanwhile, the pocket-sized fish swim lazily through the modest creeks, sipping small bugs and the occasional Elk Hair Caddis, remnants from a past, their future in doubt.

Email DAVE BUCHANAN