Making a quarterstaff is easy. Just find yourself a sapling of the type of wood your looking for. No knots or branches and as straight as possible. Ash grows as straight as you could want so that shouldn't be a problem. Cut it, debark it and dip both ends in lacquer or paint 4-5 inches. Clamp or tie it down with inner tube strips to a stout board along it's entire length to help it dry straight then find a warm dry place to let it cure. With Ash the clamping is optional though it can help. If the tree your using has very straight grain there is no need. Once it's cured for 3 days put a fan on either side to speed up the drying. If it warps badly, which is unusual with ash you can heat bend it straight.

You can also buy yourself a hardwood board and make one from that. Much faster but not quite as satisfying.

I live miles away from any trees I could cut down (legally), so getting it from a tree would be tricky.  I have heard oak makes a good staff, but I'm not sure.  Also, I was thinking about putting iron caps on the ends so it doesnt wear down and it will have an extra punch.

dork wrote on Dec 5^th, 2010 at 10:20am:

The quarter in quarterstaff probably comes from the root word meaning "house" or "protection" (as is "give no quarter") and not a measurement. There's even an eighthstaff called the hanbo, but I think that most other polearms count as wholestaves.

Samurismallz wrote on Dec 5^th, 2010 at 11:38am:

It's a joke, quarterstaves are short polearms so regular polarms are wholestaves. They just won't be 4 times larger than quarterstaves.

there are these Staffs in every business of fight sport article. In the original they are angular eight and from hard fell trees made.

these staffs are very difficult. To practice they rather take rattan staff.
these are less painful

The staff has been used as a weapon in many different cultures, and all have developed specific fighting techniques.  The Japanese call it a "bo", and thus "bojutsu".  The technique is influenced both by Okinawan "ko-budo" (ancient weapons) and by traditional Japanese use of battlefield weapons like the iron staff.
Europe had it's own traditions, of course, witness the famous "duel" between Robin Hood and Little John.  The staff was widely used for both personal defense and in warfare.
The Chinese and the Filipinos have well-refined schools of staff fighting.

In short, there's plenty of material to study.  The Filipino styles are extremely practical and the principals apply to other weapons.
Chinese staff work I've seen lately is very formalized and gymnastic, and doesn't look very practical.
The Okinawan-derived methods are pretty solid as well.
Here's a book I just found as the first Google hit on European staff fighting:

http://www.thearma.org/staffbook/staffbook.htm

Enjoy!

HurlinThom wrote on Dec 5^th, 2010 at 9:12pm:

The French have "La Canne de Combat" or "The Fighting Cane" as well as "Baton Francois," the Portuguese have "Jogo do Pau" and the Italians have "Juego del Palo" which both mean "Game of the Stick." The English systems are called "Singlestick," "Quarterstaff" (the English name isn't very creative) and "Bartitsu." All of these styles treat the stick as a long, blunted sword except for Baton Francois and Quarterstaff.

Indian quarterstaves come in two varieties, one which is like the rest of the world, straight and slightly longer than the users height; and another which is about one and a half times the users height, but s-curved so that from tip to tip it's the same length as the first.