Fishing Lines: Passionate pleasures of the cane

My first fishing rod cost 10s 6d (52.5p in today's money). It was made of cane and wasn't very good. It died, eventually, of misuse.

Last week, I received an email from a pile-'em-high tackle show, advertising rods for £4.99. That rod will be 20 times lighter, better, more adaptable and more durable than my pride of the Grand Union Canal. These days, you can get a quite superb rod for £100. So why would anyone want to fork out £1,700 for an Edward Barder?

Let me say that I have no vested interest. I don't own one; probably never will. I suspect my wife would bobbitt me if I bought even the cheapest in Barder's range, a Mark IV carp rod for a mere £1,000. His work is not even modern. We're talking seriously retro, the sort of stuff your great-grandfather might have fished with. But people wait up to two years to own one of his creations. What's the secret?

My only encounter with Barder's work has been waggling one in a vaguely fishy way at a tackle fair, so perhaps I should quote my writer friend Tom Fort. He says: "More beautiful than anything in the Uffizi or the Louvre. It tapers to a wand-like delicacy, yet is pregnant with power and resilience." Wow! And you thought we were talking about fishing rods.

There is no real reason to fish with cane. It's yesterday's material. Carbon fibre is lighter, more powerful, more forgiving. But it's soulless. Cane may be quirky, but it somehow has life, a connection with nature. It's the difference between driving a dodgem car and a classic convertible Aston Martin. Sorry: got a bit carried away there. But cane does funny things to you.

We are not talking about that wonky garden stuff that holds up your beans. This bamboo, Tonkin cane, comes from one very small area of China, and is getting increasingly hard to source. Barder's stock includes cane from 50, 60 years ago. It is seasoned, sliced into strips, straightened and cut into precise tapers so six perfect equilateral triangles create a hexagonal shape. Then it's heated, glued, sanded and sanded again.

I've made it sound simple. It isn't. Tapers are measured in thousandths of an inch and everything is done by hand. Then all the fittings (rings, cork handle, olivewood reel seat, ferrules) must be put on.

Barder showed me a small box containing rings of cork cut into circular sections. "How much for that box?" he asked.

Can't catch me out. I know that cork's become very expensive. "£25," I said.

"More than £400," he replied. "And I'll only be able to use about one in 10."

Barder and his assistant, Colin Whitehouse, turn out about a rod a week, working flat out. I'm starting to understand their £1,700 price tag. But it's only when you see the finished product that you see why people fall in love with cane, and why Barder is unquestionably Britain's finest rod-maker.

Tom Fort puts it far better than I can. "I defy anyone who loves fly-fishing and has a scintilla of soul not to thrill at the sight and feel of these exquisite creations." Angling pornography, you might say.

Edward Barder: 01635 552 916 or email: edward@barder-rod.co.uk