Drying something different

[limbrat]

After the growing season i cut and dry a few cane poles for me and a neighbor to fish with. I was wondering if anyone else did it and if so how? 

I use last years growth yellow bamboo. Cut them off low with a hacksaw and cut the limbs just above the node with a hacksaw then bend them backwards to break them off take it up till the tips about 1/16th thick. Then wash them with soap and water and loop a thin wire on the tip and hang them from a nail in the rafters hang just enough weight from the butt to pull the pole straight and leave it till its dry. The tip joint is usaly bent from hanging so i cut it off then hold it by the butt and whip it back and forth and in tight circles violently, this years wood will seperate at the joint about one out of ten of last years wood do. Sand the limb nodes and butt smooth and put a coat of urathane and your finished. They are strong i use them vertical jigging in blow downs and thickets my neighbor uses a cork for white perch and bream.

[LeeB]

I'm afraid I can't believe a word you're saying. A picture or two would prove me wrong though.  :D

[Seaman]

I too would love to see pictures. How do you pick out last years growth?
Thanks, Frank

[limbrat]

Ok pics after the first frost, Maybe oct. propably nov.. That stuff is a grass and comes up thick so most of the stems on the outside edge will be new. Inside the thicket clean stems will be new older will be stained with mold or fungus or what ever that black stuff is it washes right off. Its self pruning from shade so stems with lower limbs are mostly younger, they only live a decade or so older stems will have thicker limb tips with dead wood from old leaf growth. The older ones are dirty and look used, the newer ones are bright and shapely.

[MattJ]

I have done it once with green ones and also older stems.  The green ones shriveled like beef jerky and went limp, the older ones dried pretty well and I never coated them with anything.