Picture yourself hooking, fighting, and landing a fish. It could be a trout, a bass, or a bonefish. Regardless of your quarry, put yourself in that moment immediately after it has been unhooked. Things could play out in a few different ways:

• You could bonk it on the head and eat it later.
• It might flop out of your hands and disappear.
• You could place it back in the water and allow it to swim away.

Given the right circumstances, the first option isn’t awful. Brookies in the Rockies, hatchery steelhead, and fat panfish are delicious. By and large, fly fishers aren’t eating their catches. There isn’t anything inherently wrong with it, but the what and where usually make it prohibitive.

The second course of action is immensely dissatisfying. Especially if it is a good fish, losing it prematurely in the angling process takes something away from the experience. It is good that the fish has the vitality to release itself. Ultimately, that is what catch and release is all about. So why does an escaping fish elicit groans and hand-wringing?

Because there are still vestigial remnants of fishing’s bloodsport ancestry.

It wasn’t too long ago that fishing for fun, and not for food, was the anomaly. Sure, plenty of people did it. But it wasn’t as widespread. Environmental issues, and the resultant regulations, weren’t realized or even present. A stringer of trout was normal, a boatload of walleye was considered success, and a dock covered with a mixed bag of saltwater species made the cover of sporting magazines.

Irrespective of the present understanding of fisheries populations and other ecological factors, there is nothing wrong with killing and eating fish. It only becomes a problem when it isn’t sustainable.

So, fly fishers in particular practice catch and release. Whether it be from mercury contamination or dwindling stock or the convenience by which other foods have become available, fishing for fun has become how it’s done.

But fly fishing in 2018 isn’t something completely different than fly fishing in 1918. Even with the advancements in equipment and technique, the sport is only a few inches up the evolutionary tree from where it was a century ago. Killing is the only exception. Killing, though, is a manifestation of something else that fly fishers still aim to accomplish. It is dominion over creation.

Going back to the three scenarios above, the final option is only different than the first in regard to the shedding of blood. Both fish are hooked, fought, and landed. One is dispatched, the other is released. The angler is in control throughout the entire process. He or she has exercised dominion over a fish from start to finish. Unlike the second of the three situations (the “flop”), in the third the angler controls how the fish is released.

Ultimately, none of this changes how or why people fish. With so much written about the biological why of catch and release, I think that it is important to consider the psychological why. Considering humanity’s perception of dominion over nature is the first and most appropriate step in stewardship. The microcosm of releasing a fish illustrates this well: the thoughtful, gentle, and appreciative control shown as a tail flicks away from an open hand.