A powerful elastic cord runs through six sections and holds them together when the staff is straight and in use: a simple, familiar, reliable and convenient system.

There are two downsides to this type of staff that I know of: 1) in extreme currents the sections can be forced apart, and 2) the foot of the staff can get trapped between rocks and the staff pulls apart. The answer to the first problem is simply don’t use this type of staff in very ferocious rivers; and to the second problem pulling off the rubber foot to reveal a metal spike makes for fewer trapped moments, albeit slightly noisier wading.

The up side to this staff is that it is simply so convenient. Once the sheath is attached to a wading belt it’s there whenever needed, unlike rigid staffs which have a bad habit of staying at home or hiding in the boot of the car when they should be working.

Snowbee has added a couple of neat features to its wading staff. Unscrew the top section of the handle to reveal … a screw! Which is much more useful than it sounds, since it matches the tripod fitting in the bottom of my camera, so the staff becomes a monopod – great for more stable photographs and a damned sight more portable than my tripod.

Replace that top section with the wee plastic fitting Snowbee supplies and the butt of the staff features a little button compass. This is less useful than it sounds because this one needs to be tapped and wiggled to point north. And as a final bit of ‘added value’, squeeze the lugs on the plastic fitting and lift to reveal a folding gun rest.

Personally, the last two features are nice but have little relevance to me. I often carry a camera when fishing (often several cameras and a telephoto lens) so the monopod feature does attract me. However, the main reason for this is wading and I already use a wading staff of this type. This one is sturdier and, if anything, the composite cork grip is more secure than the small rubber grip on my one.