Cane rod makers: continued

(...this is the continuation of the notes on Sansepolcro's First Europeaan Gathering of Bamboo Rodmakers.)

Alberto Poratelli and Gabriele Gori - Streamlined Bamboo Ferrules

Among the best cane rod makers in Italy are Alberto Poratelli and Gabriele Gori.

Do you remember what Alberto Poratelli was saying about making the "invisible ferrule" in my interwiew?

What can one say about this incredible "invisible" ferrule more than to show it and to be stunned by the simplicity of the whole idea?

I think that this was even an historical moment and that Alberto's and Gabriele's method will certainly contribute in the advancement of bamboo rod making. Perhaps one day they will be remembered as the Poratelli-Gori ferrule inventors...

Below is the MOST important drawing of the whole gathering: how to make the Poratelli-Gori bamboo ferrule! You proceed as for a normal bamboo ferrule, then you heat the MALE part with a hot-air gun, which becomes deformable as you know, you tighten it with a cotton thread and the power fibers get the shape of structurally perfect MALE bamboo ferrule!

Calculation's of Gabriele Gori (elasticity module) showed that this ferrule is 4 times more flexible than a normal bamboo ferrule and 9 times more flexible than a nickel-silver ferrule!

Rolf Baginski - Fishing the cost with splitcane

Rolf presented his experience on fishing for sea trouts with friends in Dänemark.

While the topic could sound of lesser importance, Rolf Baginski's main message was very strong: why not making bamboo spinning rods?. The qualities of bamboo make the material excellent for casting a 5-6g baits up to 50m and catching 40-55cm (22'-22.5') trout fish of even 10 Kg (5 pounds)!

Rolf's set of one fly fishing bamboo rod and one spinning rod could be admired in the showroom.

Rolf always carry three rods when fishing and one is a bamboo spinning rod when in Dänemark.

Andy Royer - About a Bamboo Plantation

Andy Royer (left in the picture above with Rolf Baginski in the middle) is a bamboo broker from Seattle, USA.

The best quality of bamboo for rodbuilding is of the species "Arundinaria Amabilis" (also called "Tonkin") and the best and larger plantations are in relatively small area in Southern China (along the Sui River) where the bamboo business creates large and green forests.

Andy has been in the bamboo business for over 20 years and personally learned how to select the best bamboo culms expressly for us rodbuilders.

However, the agricultural bamboo business in the US is much bigger and Andy is dealing with that, too.

Andy, told us how difficult it was in the beginning to found suitable bamboo culms of good quality for our purpose.

Nature being as it is, the "perfect" culm does not exist, each bamboo plant has imperfections - actually, bamboo is a grass which for this species grows up to 10-12m in just 3 months and then is harvested 3-4 years later. Besides, there is not even unity of what rodbuilders think is a good quality culm: some want yellow culms, some others pay more attention to the distance from the nodes, some others want the best looking, "clean" bamboo, others prefer heavy culms, while others again wish a mixture of all above.

Andy also reminded us the historical background of the '50s, the Maoist revolution, the following US trade embargo (1950 - 1971), the Chinese new subdivision of the land to the people which made so that each villager of the area where he works got about 5 acres of bamboo plantation.

I think it is noteworthy to mention that locally the Chinese villagers consider the quality of bamboo rather differently: for them the "good" bamboo is young, "green" bamboo, suitable for many construction purposes, while "our" selected bamboo culms are of "low quality" because "old".Is there any competition from Chinese bamboo rodbuilders, then, as a person from the audience asked? No, there is no culture for fly fishing in China neither! Andy told me that the local peasants do not understand what we are doing! A typical cultural gap.