TACKLE (Continued) : Page 55

The raw materials — unsplit bamboo, fittings and varnish — of a thirty-five dollar fly rod can be bought in the open market for about twelve dollars. The difference represents profit, workmanship and selection. It requires not only considerable mechanical skill to produce a good bamboo fly rod but rare good judgment as well. From hundreds of pieces of unsplit " canes," all looking to the untrained eye pretty much alike, the rod maker must select a few coming up to his standard and likely, in his estimation, to produce the ideal he has in mind. Pieces with " shakes," borings, soft spots and other imperfections are discarded and the ones selected are then cut out roughly by machinery or split by hand with a dull knife, when other im-