News of a probable state and world record catfish being pulled from the Missouri River near Columbia Bottom Conservation Area spread quickly Tuesday and prompted local media outlets converge around Greg Bernal and his 130-lb. Blue Cat.

“I am still numb,” Bernal told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “I’m still in shock that he’s actually that big. That’s the biggest fish I’ve ever seen.”

It’s the biggest fish most of us have seen.

Greg Bernal (right) and Janet Momphard pose for a photo with the record-breaking 130 lb. Blue Catfish Bernal caught on the Missouri River near the Columbia Bottom Conservation Area. (Photo by Stephanie S. Cordle, Post-Dispatch)

A fish like this deserves great respect. At 54 inches long and 45 inches around the fish could probably have eaten the state 34-lb, 10-oz. Missouri record Channel Catfish.

Kevin Sullivan. a Missouri Department of Conservation resource scientist who specializes in catfish, estimated that a blue cat the size of Bernal’s would be at least 20 years old.

For most anglers, a world record fish would be the fish of a lifetime. But within the adrenaline rush and atta-boys lies a deeply personal challenge: Do you release the fish or do you keep it? It has survived floods, drought, predators, polluting runoff and possibly a few stink baits since about the time Vanilla Ice was stinking up the Billboard charts.

Ethical sportsmen confront this decision almost every outing. Some of us have no problem taking a trophy buck or long-sprigged bull pintail to hang on the wall but figure a fish like this deserves to be caught again.

With no right or wrong answers, we are left to our own sense of ethics to guide us.

What would you do?