A Bamboo Virgin

The other day I was talking with a friend of mine on the phone when the subject of bamboo rods came up. I don't remember what got us on the subject, since I am not a rod maker, but it's most likely we were gossiping about people we know who are rod makers. Wait -- I remember now: I was telling my friend that his name had come up over lunch with two other friends, one of whom is a rod maker, Ron Barch. (To the right, photo of Ron entertaining some fans in his booth at the Midwest Flyfishing Expo in March) Ron had been singing praises about how nice a guy my friend on the phone was. (It sure is a small flyfishing world, ain't it?) My friend then revealed that he, too, makes bamboo rods. This came as a surprise since all the bamboo rod makers I know do it as a business, not on the side for fun.

Either that or they do it as a religion, which I was just learning about through two books given to me by Ron at lunch. (In addition to being a builder of hugely sought-after bamboo fly rods, Ron is also publisher and owner of Alder Creek Publishing. ) The books, written by Kathy Scott, are about - you guessed it - split cane bamboo-rods and the people who make them ) "Caneiacs" I've read they call themselves. My job was to read the books and decide if I wanted to sell them through my online business, The Painted Trout. (More on this in a later blog.) At the time of this telephone conversation, I may have only finished one (Moose on the Water, Bamboo on the Bench) and had started on the second (Changing Planes). At any rate, what I was learning was that the business of making, creating, crafting, building - forging - a bamboo flyrod was astonishingly complex, difficult, arduous, painstaking, but above all artful. Oh, did I mention, frightening? I was learning that the decisions, incisions, revisions (there's scant room for such), calculations, permutations, ministrations and divinations are simply words to describe the practically spiritual ordeal of making such a work of art. I'd always known it was a delicate business, but now I knew why rod making could consume a person's passions.

I told my friend about a guy from Wisconsin who built split-cane rods, one of which I cast at the Great Waters Flyfishing Expo in Schaumberg, Illinois last year. This guy had a school for people who wanted to learn to make a rod. At the time this idea seemed intriguing (after all, I am a createaholic), but I knew I would probably never have the time. His rods were for sale and available to try out in the casting area. Gingerly, I took one, though after a few casts I grew nervous around the flycasters who were trying to elbow their way to a casting spot far too close for comfort, so I quickly returned the rod. Bamboo fly rods had always frightened me, the way tiny infants frighten me. I had always thought that such a precious thing as a home-made split cane bamboo rod, just like a home-made tiny infant, was way out of my league in both value and fragility. Neither my casting nor my fishing, nor indeed any aspect of me on the water, was any work of art or craftsmanship -- so who was I to fish with one?

When I told my friend on the phone that I had only once cast a bamboo rod, he quickly jumped in. "Well then," he said. "The next rod I make must be yours."
"Must be"? What? Are you serious?
Yes, he said. He explained that rod makers like to make rods, one and then another and then another, and that furthermore the rods they make belong with people who might like them, with people who will fish with them. After all, there are only so many bamboo rods a bamboo rod maker can keep for himself. It's a difficult craft to learn and to master, so it takes a lot of rod building to get good. It follows, therefore, that every rod must have a home.

Well, okay, I agreed, mostly humoring him. Not that he'd lie exactly; it was more like he had me mistaken for someone who was actually worthy. Such a mistake could only be called insanely nice, and I learned long ago from a very good shrink (there were only two) what to do when faced with an insane person: you humor him.

So from there I planned to avoid the subject for a while, thereby giving him an "out" into which he could toss a polite excuse that he'd forgotten the whole idea. Either that or into which he could escape under the protection of being, well, insane.
But no, in a follow-up email, he explained that it would be a 7 foot 4-5 weight and asked what kind of wood might I like in my reel seat. Now there's a question you don't get asked every day.
I went along with him and answered that walnut, cherry, and maple were nice; whatever "went with" the rest of the rod. I could play the game.
Then I let it slip. I said something in the same email that I felt "so very unworthy."
"Unworthy?!" he e-snapped back. "Nonsense, you are a child of the Universe, no less than the moon and the stars....You have a right to be here...Me, I'm thinkin' cherry maybe."

I shut up after that. But in a later phone conversation, I got to be grateful for real.
Golly, I said. Thank you. I'm honored.

On March 31, I got an email: "I glued up the butt section of your rod this past weekend and hope to plane and glue the tip this coming. Wish me luck - tips are tricky."

We exchanged progress and problem stories about our respective arts for a while. I was laboring over a disaster regarding the printing of a new design on three silk scarves.
"I understand setbacks very well," he e-plied. "On the last rod I built I glued up the tip section with one of the six strips turned enamel side in! Had to start over and develop a 'check' step so it doesn't happen again.
So many ways to screw up - so little time."
That was an understatement, I thought.

April 6: "Planed your tip section Saturday morning and it glued up beautifully. Pictures at 11:-- or soon."
"I await!" I e-gushed in reply. All that day I checked my email obsessively (well, more obsessively than normal, let's say), hoping for photos, but alas, none came. I didn't want to pester him, so I pretended to be patient.

Finally, photos came through this past Monday... which I've been peppering in through the text. Here are some more...





"I turned 5 reel seats for your rod until I was
satisfied with the character of the wood.

This past weekend I glued up the cork for your handle and turned it to shape on the lathe (I love that part ). I also attached the reel seat and began to fit the ferrules."





"Your rod is my eighth rod. I had Ron Barch over my shoulder on my first rod as well as a few books on the craft."








"We start with a 12 foot culm of Tonkin bamboo or cane 2" to 2.5" in diameter. The culm is cut in half and split into strips about 3/8th wide. The nodes are filed flat and the strips must be straightened with heat (ugh, it's the part I do not enjoy). From there the strips must be planed into 60 x 60 x 60 degree parallel strips and then to a specific tapered design [See sheet in photo at top of this blog]. That's the design of your rod. The strips are then glued together using a binder and hung to dry. When the excess glue is sanded off, if the section is not straight, heat and pressure are applied. Your rod sections came out straight as an arrow."





I haven't asked for an ETA, since part of me still thinks this could be an elaborate practical joke (not in character with my friend, true, but very in character with the other characters I know in this sport). And I only mention it now as a way to say "Don't Touch That Dial" -- I'll be right back with an update as soon as one comes in.