How do you lighten the tackle load in the boat?

[King31]

I've been working hard on this. One thing I realized more recently than I care to admit: soft plastics weigh a lot, and they take up a lot of room. So while I could maybe shave some weight by removing a few spinnerbaits I won't use from the box, the spinnerbait box is still there and still weighs basically the same. My biggest problem comes from the plastics.

I also realized (a little longer ago, but still more recently than I want to admit) that I just don't need 11 styles of a bait in 8 colors. I cover my bases for the techniques I use, try to stick to one bait that fits a "category," then carry enough of them in the 1-3 colors I might throw. For me, that's basically green pumpkin. I'll occasionally throw black, and there are certain bodies of water where I throw white. I've stuck all my white soft plastics into their own bag that I grab when I'm fishing those places so that's taken care of. A container of JJ's is something that helps me a lot too as I think the primary reason I often carried other colors was to have something different that would catch attention. A quick dip in JJ's solves that.

Just as an example: Let's say I want a beaver style bait. I don't need to carry D-Bombs, Rodents, Palmetto Bugz, Sweet Beavers, Z Hogs, and 3 others I picked up at tackle shows over the years. If I want larger finesse worm, the 6" Roboworm works great. I don't need Trick Worms and Bottom Hoppers and Plasma Tails and KVD Finesse Worms and so on. Even though I could talk myself into believing each one has a place and that I might just maybe need that Okeechobee Craw or one with chartreuse tips when the fish won't bite plain green pumpkin or black, I've never been in a situation where that actually turned out to be the case. Or if it was, I never actually switched around to try it. So what good does it actually do to carry all that stuff? I'll take an overloaded (so I don't run out) pack of one of the varieties and roll with it.

The way I convinced myself this is the way to go is to fish a few tournaments carrying all the stuff I used to carry. The difference is that I put together a single bag of the stuff I was most likely to use, basically following the one bait per category and 1-2 colors per bait strategy. Then I went fishing, focusing on the stuff in the single container. Keep in mind I had everything else so it was still there "just in case," but it became clear quickly that I really didn't need the just in case stuff. A tough tournament following this strategy was the ultimate test, and it still worked. In fact, it may have worked better. I've since removed a bunch and found myself fishing better as a result. The obvious thing is being more efficient as I'm not digging through stuff looking for what I want or tripping over a bunch of junk. I also think it keeps me focused on the most important thing, actually finding the (right) fish. Once they're found, I still have plenty of variety to catch them.

If I run into a specific situation where things are different than expected, I can always grab that stuff from the garage and take it along.

My weakness is still when a new style of soft plastic hits the market, or maybe more generally when I have a really good day on a soft plastic that doesn't have a lot of other baits like it. I have a hard time not grabbing those and tossing them in. Sometimes I suppose it's worth allowing for a new "category" when that happens, even though I know it's almost always just hype. Hey, nobody's perfect!

Very well said.

[Mcjenson]

I've been working hard on this. One thing I realized more recently than I care to admit: soft plastics weigh a lot, and they take up a lot of room. So while I could maybe shave some weight by removing a few spinnerbaits I won't use from the box, the spinnerbait box is still there and still weighs basically the same. My biggest problem comes from the plastics.

I also realized (a little longer ago, but still more recently than I want to admit) that I just don't need 11 styles of a bait in 8 colors. I cover my bases for the techniques I use, try to stick to one bait that fits a "category," then carry enough of them in the 1-3 colors I might throw. For me, that's basically green pumpkin. I'll occasionally throw black, and there are certain bodies of water where I throw white. I've stuck all my white soft plastics into their own bag that I grab when I'm fishing those places so that's taken care of. A container of JJ's is something that helps me a lot too as I think the primary reason I often carried other colors was to have something different that would catch attention. A quick dip in JJ's solves that.

Just as an example: Let's say I want a beaver style bait. I don't need to carry D-Bombs, Rodents, Palmetto Bugz, Sweet Beavers, Z Hogs, and 3 others I picked up at tackle shows over the years. If I want larger finesse worm, the 6" Roboworm works great. I don't need Trick Worms and Bottom Hoppers and Plasma Tails and KVD Finesse Worms and so on. Even though I could talk myself into believing each one has a place and that I might just maybe need that Okeechobee Craw or one with chartreuse tips when the fish won't bite plain green pumpkin or black, I've never been in a situation where that actually turned out to be the case. Or if it was, I never actually switched around to try it. So what good does it actually do to carry all that stuff? I'll take an overloaded (so I don't run out) pack of one of the varieties and roll with it.

The way I convinced myself this is the way to go is to fish a few tournaments carrying all the stuff I used to carry. The difference is that I put together a single bag of the stuff I was most likely to use, basically following the one bait per category and 1-2 colors per bait strategy. Then I went fishing, focusing on the stuff in the single container. Keep in mind I had everything else so it was still there "just in case," but it became clear quickly that I really didn't need the just in case stuff. A tough tournament following this strategy was the ultimate test, and it still worked. In fact, it may have worked better. I've since removed a bunch and found myself fishing better as a result. The obvious thing is being more efficient as I'm not digging through stuff looking for what I want or tripping over a bunch of junk. I also think it keeps me focused on the most important thing, actually finding the (right) fish. Once they're found, I still have plenty of variety to catch them.

If I run into a specific situation where things are different than expected, I can always grab that stuff from the garage and take it along.

My weakness is still when a new style of soft plastic hits the market, or maybe more generally when I have a really good day on a soft plastic that doesn't have a lot of other baits like it. I have a hard time not grabbing those and tossing them in. Sometimes I suppose it's worth allowing for a new "category" when that happens, even though I know it's almost always just hype. Hey, nobody's perfect!

Dude, you described my issues with too much stuff almost exactly there. Just off the top of my head for dropshot I know I have flatworms, smallie smashers, finesse slammers, dream shots- which are all basically the exact bait profile. I could likely get away with just carrying flatworms (which I throw 75% of the time anyways lol) and not really miss out on much. My other issue is my plastics are split up, some stuff is in planos, so are in worm bags. It's convenient having stuff you use a ton in planos (especially stuff like senkos that rip all the time), but it leads to me carrying too much stuff. Thinking this winter / offseason I'm going to really try to reduce how much junk I carry, especially carrying stuff I know I won't be using at all on certain lakes.