Picking your favorite fish replica is kind of like picking your favorite child – they all have different pros and cons. Of the eight mounts we have, my cutthroat is the smallest, but it provides a disproportionate amount of joy. I caught it on our 10^th anniversary trip to Triple Creek Ranch in Montana in 2015.

Many of my fellow traveling anglers start off being serious bass fishermen, then taste peacock bass in Brazil, and subsequently head even further south to places like Argentina or Uruguay to chase Golden Dorado. We’ll get there, and if manage to catch a trophy, I might just have to get a replica.

When I finally caught a replica-worthy musky, it was a pure strain that Hanna had replicated as a surprise gift. I’m thrilled with it, even if I think tiger muskies are sometimes prettier. If and when I catch a big tiger, maybe we’ll add one to the wall.

On our trips out of Seward, Alaska, we’ve caught some lingcod – a semi-hideous species that we’re told tastes great. We’ve never caught a giant, but even if we did I’m not sure that we’d consider one for a replica, but apparently some people do, because there are some great examples out there.

I’ll admit that it’s an unfair form of fish bigotry that I’ve never considered blue catfish as a desirable species for a replica mount. We typically don’t target them, but one time that we did we had a blast and caught eight of them between 32 and 59 pounds.

Despite being one of the most majestic and distinctive fish we’ve caught, I don’t feel like many people consider an Arctic Grayling as a prime candidate for the wall. That’s a mistake, because grayling punch above their weight and stand out in a crowd.