My fly fishing addiction started quite early for me. Since the early age of ten my father had been regularly taking me and my younger brother fly fishing on one of the best European chalk streams, the river Unica. There I have made my first casts and also have caught my first fish with a dry fly. Since then, fly fishing has always had a huge impact on my life. I cannot explain my feelings when I am standing by a river, pursuing trout, grayling or some other fish. Maybe it is something like visiting a church for some; it lets me connect with everything - from my life, my own thoughts to the nature. With years I got really involved with fly fishing and a few years back I also set my mind to it, that fly fishing is something that I really want to do “professionally” for the rest of my life.
As a big nature lover, conservationists and supporter of sustainable fishing I first got involved in my local angling club Vrhnika, where I am a member of the environmental group and also an angling warden. I was also collecting and inputting data for our biggest online database that is run by the Angling Association of Slovenia and has more than 10.000 entries on small polluters of our local rivers. In the more recent years I have also established my own guiding services Urko Fishing Adventures, where we offer and promote amazing opportunities for fly fishing on the best rivers in Slovenia, with some unique and rare fish species as the Marble trout and the Danube salmon (Hucho Hucho).
Being a guide also gives me the opportunity to promote and share my beliefs or let’s say my ethics on how a modern fly fisher should act on the river and how he handles his catch to minimize its stress as much as possible. This also means that the #keepfishwet movement is something that I feel right at home with and also reflects my own stand on the matter. And did I forget to mention that I also love to take photos of my fishing adventures too? I am definitely not a professional with a camera, but I do manage to occasionally get some shots right! ;)
Tight lines to everyone and #keepfishwet!
