zfisher I fish with Paco alot so our opinions are pretty much the same. I also like natural materials (bucktail, feather, throw in some rabbit here and there). I have not fished the synthetics but from what I am told you get false hooksets occasionally from the synthetic material getting caught in the roof of a musky's mouth. Also I don't think you can get as much water pushing profile with synthetics unless you make it really bulky which will make it harder to cast. Look at Brad Bohens hangtime thats pretty much what we throw with some variations. For leaders like paco said with flourocarbon you will get bit off occassionally but it is rare. I have been bit off 2 times in 2 years and have caught over 50 toothy critters now so that's a pretty good batting average. The wire kinks bad is not as easy to tie as they claim and will rarely even break. I think the benefits of the flourocarbon is the bonus fish you catch such as walleye, smallmouth, largemouth, etc.. I don't think you would hook up on these fish as much using wire. As far as habitat goes in rivers you will find them in some of the faster water but 90% of the time they are in some sort of current break (behind a boulder, in some weeds, backwater eddy, etc...) and definitely always throw to the bigger holes. Lake fishing is a little more complicated because you can't read the water as well. In lakes the fish will generally be in the shallows near weeds or on steep dropoffs looking up for baitfish. LIke jay said with winter coming they will be moving off the shallows soon if not already. Remember they are ambush predators so anything that looks like they can sit and hide likely has a toothy in there. And I say it time and time again keep your head in the game. It takes a level of dedication to do this that most people are not willing to do. You will fish long days and may not see a fish for weeks or hook up on one for months. But I guarantee that it will eventually happen and when it does I promise you there is NOTHING like it.
