First I would like to salute anyone who routinely carries a fishing kit. I, too, have been fishing from an early age and it is probably what lead me to enjoy the outdoors more than any other activity.

Opinions are like you-know-what and elbows, everyone has one. So here's mine:

1. Ditch everything that is soft plastic or feathers; replace them with hard-bodied lures that will not melt, tear, tear out, etc.

2. Carry no bare hooks; replace them with the color and flash of various spoon-type and jig-type lures starting with tiny ice-fishing sizes. You can bait the hooks on the spoons or jigs, but there is usually no need for bait- spend your time fishing instead of looking for bait. If you want to use bait, use parts of the fish you catch.

3. Use flurocarbon line and leader, because it is essentially invisible in water and is typically much stronger for a given diameter than monofilament.

Learn to swim, rip, hop, and slack line each bait through all parts of the water column.

This is not a survival fishing kit, so leave the bare bones survival stuff out of it. You may find adopting this gear so effective that you will re-think the appropriateness of classic bare bones survival fishing gear.