Different wood for stick making?

[Ian McBean]

Hi everyone,
I am interested in making some wading staffs for fishing in the river and was curious as to which woods can be used for the staff. I know hazel and ash are great for sticks but are other woods like rowan any good? just starting in this area and any info would be really appreciated.

Cheers Ian.

 

[Macaroon]

For wading staffs, the more dense/heavy the wood the better; you've hit on one of the best there with Rowan, a heavy and very strong and durable wood. Blackthorn is very good and resilient wood, but use it peeled of bark and treated regularly with oil finish. Holly is really good and easy to source in long straight bits but has driven many to distraction with it's propensity to split whilst seasoning; Holly, if the finish wears off at all, is very slippery indeed when wet so most people who use it will spend a lot of time on the finish to make it as durable as possible.

Because wading staffs are usually much longer than most, it's possible to make them in two pieces which gives some definite advantages. It means you can pack and carry them much more easily, but more importantly you can use a lighter wood for the top half and one of the heavier woods above for the bottom half which makes the staff biased to sink in the water before you've even added any weight to the end.

Asb with any other craft, there are no hard and fast rules and a lot of the pleasure and learning is to experiment and find out what works best for what you need to achieve. Let us see your results here, eh?

 

[Ian McBean]

Thanks very much for all the info Macaroon, really usefull. I like the idea of the split staff and I like the thought of maybe splicing it like the old greenheart rods used to get done with a leather strap.