Depends on the size of the boat.  A bass boat is really just a mobile casting deck and tackle box, so I load it to the hilt.

 

Nature abhors a vacuum.

I take EV-ERY-THING, I mean everything! Both poles, all seven crankbaits, both packages of swimbaits, my chatterbait, and both pairs of pliers, the small ones and the big ones. Yup, you heard it... two pair even when I can only use one at a time.

I've been collecting stuff for years. Ashamed at how only very little of it actually hits the water. I'm a hoarder I guess. I've been working all winter (can't fish now so gotta do something) to try to thin it out a bit. Having very little luck.

 

You guys are funny.....

If your boat starts sinking, that's when you know that you have too much tackle in your boat.

When I'm in a boat I take 4 to 5 rods, and my bag with 5 3700 boxes and as much stuff as I can squeeze into the sides.  When I'm fishing off of the bank it's usually 2 or 3 rods, and a small tackle box with a little bit of everything crammed into it.

About this much   At some places or certain times of the year I'll have less.  Like right now in the winter it's probably about half this and summer on tidal water is probably about half as well.  I don't load stuff that I know I'm not going to need.  

 

 

I do make an effort not to let my tackle get out of hand...But I live in an are where I fish many different types of water bodies and all 4 seasons, so over the course of a year I need to use just about everything at some point.  

I'm kinda like Steve Martin in the jerk when he's been abandoned by everyone and he says, "I don't need you! I don't need anything!!!....(?)... I NEED THIS!!!!"

in the little johnny, it’s two rods and a small worm binder with the clasp rings and pages removed. i have around 10 bags of plastics, hooks, bullets, spike it, megastrike, hook out, needle nose pliers, small rapala scale and nail clippers. and my pocket knife. in the Javelin i’ll carry my tackle bag and more rods but i could honestly get by with much less.

When I start tripping over stuff in my boat, that is when it crosses my mind that there is a storage issue.  Then you must pile stuff on top of other stuff to create a wider path.

 

More seriously though, when I'm on a lake that is going to require a serious amount of running ( like Truman Lake )  I cut down to stuff I think I might use that day, primarily so that I avoid that random wave that might catch my sideways and throw stuff out of the boat, and soft plastics are all in bags kept on the floor of the boat and all rods are bungeed to the deck when I'm running.