Louisa Karl, who has been either vegan or vegetarian for most of her life, has recently taken up spearfishing.
"I do like to eat fish and meat but … sustainability is something that concerns me," she said.
"And to me, it was logical and interesting to get into spear fishing."
Ms Karl said the sport allowed fishers to understand how their prey fit into its environment and assess the health of both, so they could make "the best decisions" about which fish to shoot.
"And I really like that about it," she said.
The new wave of 'spearos'
Ms Karl is one of a quickly-growing number of beginner spearfishers mainly learning the sport for sustainability reasons, according to Tasmanian instructor Kaeo Landon-Lane.
While Mr Landon-Lane began instructing in Bicheno and Hobart less than a year ago, he has been spearfishing in Tasmanian waters since he was a young boy.
And in the last few years years, he has seen a dramatic change in the types of people taking up spearfishing.
"It used to be a fairly male-dominated kind of thing," Mr Landon-Lane said.
"Spearos" were mainly "blokey blokes" who were keen to get their fix of adrenaline while catching crayfish for dinner, he said.
But the new generation of spearfishers was comprised of many more women, Mr Landon-Lane said, with a strong contingent of "hippies" and other "people who think a lot about what they eat."
"So you actually do end up with a fair few [former] vegans and vegetarians," he said.
To shoot or not to shoot?
Just like fishing with a rod, spearfishing in Tasmania has limits on the size and number of fish allowed to be caught.
There is a minimum size limit for "pretty much every fish", Mr Landon-Lane explained, and a maximum for some fish too.
Two species — bream and boarfish — could not be speared at all, and some others could only be speared in certain seasons, he said.
While these limits are designed to prevent overfishing, Mr Landon-Lane believes it is the "responsible mindset" of many spearfishers that makes their fishing sustainable.
Spearos spend time underwater with their prey in the ecosystems they inhabit, so they get "really in tune" with how these environments are faring, according to Mr Landon-Lane.
"If you go out and take some abalone from a crack in a rock, next time you come back, you'll see that those abalone aren't there," he said.
"And you notice how that builds up over time … you can see you are having an impact on that reef.
"You feel very responsible for what you're taking … and you can control that."
Ms Karl, who is studying paleoceanography in Hobart, also believes that spearfishing helps fishers understand the state of the marine environment they are fishing in.
"Because you can see if there are lots of fish, and how the environment looks … 'Is it healthy or not?'" she said.
Also, by getting a close look at the fish in a particular school or on a reef, spearfishers could target an appropriate fish, of the right size, a good weight, and not carrying eggs, she said.
"I go for the most abundant ones, where I know it's not too damaging when I take one for my dinner," she said.
Conversely, she described recently encountering a large, healthy-looking fish of a common species, which she chose to leave alone.
"[I thought] 'It seems like this is the only one of its species hanging around here that is of good size and looks good, so I will not take it because … I feel like its role is too important right now," Ms Karl said.
She said with rod fishing you could only determine the appropriateness of a fish to kill after it had experienced the stress of being hooked, reeled in and handled.
But those decisions can be made earlier by a spearfisher.
"I can just not shoot them," she said.
Mr Landon-Lane agreed most spearfishers thought carefully before they shot due to the "very, very personal" nature of the sport.
"It's not like going out and hiding behind a scope, and being so far away from your prey that they don't even know you're there," he said.
"We are right there with the fish … meeting head on.
"[You think] 'Right, this fish is a perfectly normal healthy fish, and after I pull this trigger it will be a critically injured or dead fish immediately."
And spearfishers, he explained, felt the weight of this "very final decision."
Riding a new wave
Ms Karl said she was occasionally reminded that she was part of a new and different wave of spearfishers.
She said some male spearfishers were "a little bit surprised" to see a woman with a spear gun, but that overall they were "pretty accepting" and willing to share their knowledge.
With lots more to learn about spearfishing, and new waters to explore when she moves to Norway later this year, Ms Karl said she would love to continue with the sport in the future.
"It's a nice way to interact with your environment, and also catch some food," she said.
"And when you have friends who are also into it, it's a really nice way to spend your day, to go out together and have a cook-up session afterwards.
"I definitely want to keep it up."
