Outdoorsmen Adventures.com

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal

Fine bamboo rods are rooted in angling tradition. Names such as Leonard, Payne, Edwards, Thomas, Garrison, Gillum and Dickerson are just a few of the “classic” bamboo rod makers of years past.

Today there are only a few companies offering fine bamboo rods and their costs are high. Their rods run from $1,395 up to $3,500.

However, it is basement rod makers or small companies of one or two craftsmen who are suppling the majority of bamboo rods to the public. For the most part, their prices run from $750 to about $1,500, although you can pay much more if you want. Their lower prices reflect less investment in overhead compared to the big companies, not necessarily a reduction in quality.

Some have two or three year waiting lists, because a production of 50 rods a year would be very high. Most make in the vicinity of 10 to 20 rods each year. So just how are these rods made?

Well, there are something like 700 individual steps in completing a bamboo rod. I’ll gloss over much of the detail of the process in the interest of brevity.

The making begins with a culm (pole) of bamboo grown on a small hillside in China. The pole is 12 feet long. The butt section of the rod is made from the bottom six feet of culm and the two tips from the top six feet.

Each pole is split into 24 pieces of 1/4 to 5/16 inches in width. Six pieces are selected for the butt section and 12 for the two tips.

Six strips are placed on the workbench and the nodes are staggered. No two nodes should appear next to each other on a rod.

Next, the nodes have to be sanded and leveled. Then using a heat gun each node is heated and then flattened and straightened in a vice.

The strips are then rough planned into 60 degree angles approximately 40 thousands of an inch larger than finished size.

The strips are not tapered at this point. Then they are bound together with string on the binder, and placed in the heat treating oven. Cooking the bamboo drives out moisture and natural oils, making the strips harder and more resilient to bending.… Continue reading

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal.

For the past 12 years, I have spent most winter evenings and a lot of weekends planing bamboo in my basement workshop.

I make split bamboo fly rods.

I begin with a culm (pole) of cane 12 feet long and cut in half. From that I split out sections roughly 1/4 to 5/8ths inches wide.

Roughly 60 to 80 hours later, I have a finished fly rod.

I began making bamboo fly rods because I couldn’t afford to buy one. Now, as I like to say, $10,000 later, I have all the bamboo rods I could want.

With borrowed tools and cane, back in 1977 I made my first rod. I worked at it for two years and then had to give the equipment back. In those days there were probably less than a dozen bamboo fly rod makers in the country and practically no published information on how to build one.

Because of a trade embargo with China, none of the cane suitable for fly rod building was imported. The cane I initially used was purchased before the embargo from Herters by Jim Stone, a friend and great fisherman who made split bamboo spinning rods as a hobby. For the next several years, my rod making ambitions languished for want of a proper planing form and other materials needed to make rods.

The trade embargo was lifted in 1975 and in 1977 a book was published which would rekindle the interest in bamboo rod making.

“A Master’s Guide to Building a Bamboo Fly Rod,” by Everett Garrison with Hoagy B. Carmichael was the book which was to become known as “The Bible” among bamboo rod makers.… Continue reading