How much is enough?

As I go through the winter doldrums,ice keeping me from doing the wading I hold so vital to enjoying my fishing, I pacify myself as you probably do: cleaning, stocking and rearranging my tackle.

I find the usual mess, hastily stowed gear as I switch on the water from one lure to another, plastic worms and grubs melted to the boxes they reside in, carefully sorted hooks all mixed together, rock-hard Powerbait still on the hook, flies in the pockets of my vest instead of in their box, old used band aids and so much more gunk that it makes me swear (like I do every winter) that this year will be the year I put everything back in it's place every single time.

(Ya-hunh. Right.)

I did manage this time to transfer all my bass spinnerbaits from hard boxes to soft packs, same thing with a lot of my plastics. This is to allow me to carry them in my vest which never seems to have enough pockets, yet gives me backache when I carry too much.

I moved my inline spinners (Roostertails mostly) to a new, vest-friendly box, refilled my terminal tackle supply boxes (sinkers, hooks and bobbers), filled a small box with small crankbaits designed to catch panfish, refilled my Case's Jack's Worm box (oh yeah, they get their own box!), relocated a ton of flies to different boxes to fit the vest I bought and to my dismay realized it had smaller pockets than the old vest and won't hold my Bugger box or bass fly box, and basically just had fun playing with everything.

After a few hours I came to that old familiar realization that for some reason has yet to propel me to solve it's presence: I have lures that are still in the box which I bought years ago! I have bird skins that I bought in my first couple of years of fly tying! In a nutshell:

I have way too much stuff that I don't use, seeing this every year has not pushed me to do anything about it, and that's just gotta change.

I know why it happens. That's no mystery. I have a selection of flies and lures that work very well for me and I start to fear branching out because I might not catch fish. That and the fact that I have particular methods I enjoy most. I like throwing particular lures and I like throwing particular flies. Still, a pile of unused stuff like this is just downright sinful and I've gotta do something about it.

Seems like there are two really obvious options: either start using it or get it into the hands of someone who will. I already do this with the flies I tie. I tie far more than I fly fish so pretty much every year I end up giving away a couple hundred flies just so that they don't go to waste. I could sell some of the lures I guess, but I really do like catching fish with different approaches at different times. There's a real thrill to the particular slam that comes only when a fish stops a Roostertail cold in the water. The violence of of a crankbait strike near the surface can take your breath away.

I've got plastics I haven't touched yet they are proven fish getters! I have no problem giving stuff away, especially since I ain't using it anyway. However, I think that with much of it I need to go ahead and put it to use to keep my all-around fishing skills from atrophy.

I'd hate to forget how to put together a decent Carolina Rig! (You remember those doncha?)