File:The rubber tree book (1913) (14756013566).jpg

Identifier: rubbertreebook00macl (find matches)
Title: The rubber tree book
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Maclaren, W. F. de Bois
Subjects:
Publisher: London : Maclaren & sons
Contributing Library: University of British Columbia Library
Digitizing Sponsor: University of British Columbia Library

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
When the first few Hevea rubber trees planted in the MiddleEast came to the bearing stage the planters had no idea howthey were to get the rubber out of them. In Ceylon, as in theFederated Malay States, the planters attacked the trees withaxes and knives and slashed them all over the stems. Whenthe latex ran out and dried on the tree stems it was rolled upinto balls and shipped off to the London market, where firstconsignments fetched from two shillings and ninepence to threeshillings per pound. It was soon obvious to planters that morerefined methods of tapping must be employed. Small V cuts all over the bark succeeded the system ofgeneral slashing, but were found to leave the bark in a veryrough and irregular state. Indeed, the small V cuts and theuse of the pricker were the cause of the death of an immensenumber of fine old trees which, with reasonable treatment,might have been alive and yielding large returns at the presentday. The trees which have survived such treatment show by
Text Appearing After Image:
Fig. 35.—An Old Rubber Tree showing the Results of previous Bad Tapping. TAPPING 145 their swollen trunks, covered with growths of burrs, and bytheir rough, corrugated bark, how much they resented the ill-usage. Many such trees are still to be found in Ceylon, Sumatraand elsewhere, and serve the purpose of an object-lesson. There is no more fatal system of tapping than the use ofthe pricker, still advocated by some. Undoubtedly the yieldsof latex are, for a time, much increased by its use, but these in-creased yields have to be paid for very dearly indeed later on.The wounding of the cambium of the tree by the pricker isalways followed by such an extraordinary development of burrgrowths and abnormal swellings that no smooth portions areleft on the bark of the trunks where it is possible to tap thetrees. By cutting out the growths, by manuring and resting thetrees, it has been possible to recover a good many of such trees,both in Ceylon and Sumatra, but by far the greater numberhave

Note About Images