I am looking for a staff that would be durable, but i need it to be pretty flexible. I have trained with a big heavy red oak bo for the last few years, and i would like to find something ligter and more flexible. I don't think rattan would be strong enough to take some banging, but i have heard that waxwood is flexible and pretty durable. What do you think would be best?

Well being a proud owner of a waxwood staff, I must say if flexibility, durability and light weight is what you are looking for, it would be a good choice. The stuff is simply amazing. I use my red oak staff for training as well (its great work out on the arms and wrists), but will use my waxwood staff for speed. It quite amazing stuff, however obtaining it may be a little harder. The stuff isn't cheap and you may only find it online. I was lucky enough to get mine at a local martial arts store. The owner had to have it imported from china. Also you can get waxwood staffs in really large sizes, mine for example is 7 feet 1 inch long!

Waxwood staffs are easy to get online and fairly cheap.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=waxwood+staffs

I was looking into that SANCHIN31, and at first I thought that was a great deal, however they really do kill you on shipping (large item). At least they would of for me b/c I live in Canada. It would have ended up costing me far more to get it shipped off the internet, than to buy it from the store.

However looking at one of the stores in Sanchin's link I see that shipping will be fairly decent within the US (provided thats not Alaska or Hawaii). With exchange, shipping and tax , you will probably end up paying about as much as I did (mine was about $45 CAN). So thats pretty decent.

There are many other woods available and depending on shape of bo can be quite flexible. A lot also depends on intended use. There is Jatoba, Brazilian cherry, Ipe (ironwood), Bubinga, Cocobolo and others. Being a carpenter I see a lot of exotic hardwoods.