Rapala Original Floating F09 - Perch

3½ inches, 3/16 oz, balsa. Same wounded-minnow roll as the smaller Original, with enough weight to cast on a stiffer rod and enough profile to interest a fish that won't move for something tiny. It still runs three to five feet on a steady retrieve, floats at rest, and backs up over a rock when you stop reeling.

Perch is the match-the-hatch color for most Utah reservoirs. Yellow perch are the forage base in a lot of this state's water, which means the walleye, tiger muskie, brown, or big largemouth you're casting to has spent its whole life eating exactly this shape and these markings. The bars matter more than the gold does — a barred flank breaks up the outline and reads as a living fish rather than a painted piece of wood, which is what you need in clear water and high sun when a fish gets a long look before it commits. Two No. 8 trebles, hand-tuned and tank-tested.