September 



1906.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



385 



CRUDE RUBBER AND PLANTING INTERESTS. 



(UIBBRR RXPIOITATION IN BRAZIL 

 * NICW Loiuloii notation is the Dc Mcllo liiazilian Ktil)- 

 / \ her Co., Limited, with ^495,000 capital, of which 

 _/.'i 75,000 was o fie refi for siiliscription. The ven(h)rs 

 take the oriliiiarj' shares, ,^,270,000, in ])art pay 

 nuiit Tile directorate includes some names important in 

 tr.ulc ami commerce, including a member of Callender's 

 Cable and Construction Co. (London) ; two directors of 8ul 

 taiiats (In llaut Oubanijui, trading on the Congo ; and Se- 

 hastiao Francisco de Mello, rubber merchant of Manaos, 

 Brazil. The companj' was formed to acquire the productive about 1000 square miles (they were all cut down) had been 



lectors into the forest and encountered specimens uj) to more 

 than iO(j feet in height, one of which when cut down yielded 

 u])vvards of i cwt. of dry rubber. Trees of smaller sizes 

 yicUlt'd from 50 to 60 pounds of rubber. It should be borne 

 in mind that tropical forests contain a bewildering ]>rofusion 

 of species of plants struggling for existence. Thus important 

 trees like cinchona, rubber, mahogany, and the like are sparse- 

 ly distributed—sometimes only a few trees throughout hun- 

 dreds of acres. If all the rubber trees that comprised the 

 virgen rubber zone spontaneously distributed throughout 



rubl)er estates and business of vSenhor de Mello, partly in 

 the .Vcre district and partly in the state of Amazonas, com 

 ])rising about 700,000 acres, and producing 3S5 tons of rub- 

 ber in 1905 and an average of 300 tons for five years past. 

 Of course only a small percentage of the rubber trees on the 

 property have been tapped, and it is planned to extend o|)c- 

 rations. The prospectus, from which these data are gleaned, 

 saj-s that above 1200 rubber gatherers are at work. The 



concentrated in a specific area this would have been onlj- 

 400 or 500 acres. " Hence, " says Mr. Thomson, "the im- 

 portance of establishing plantations ; and plantations are 

 not cut down as the wild trees are thej- yield perpetual 

 returns under cultivation. " 



Whereas the other important rubber species grow in the 

 hottest /.ones on the earth this Saf>iiaii is indigenous to the 

 cool liracing temperature of lofty tropical mountains. The 



assets taken over, from February i, i()o6, include two temperature on these mountains is like a perennial Ivnglish 



steamers, launches, horses and mules, etc., on the property ; spring, comparable to that on the mountains of Ceylon, 



and real estate in Manaos. The house of de Mello & Co. where so many Englishmen fiock. Hence, to prospective 



are among the larger receivers of rubber at Manaos and planters settling in Jamaica the climatic conditions involved 



among the exporters of rubber to Europe. are such as to claim their attention for Sapiiim as a species 



A VAlJIABI F. RDBBhR TRhk 

 IN COIOMBIA. 



TilK " virgen " rubber of 

 Colombia is discussed in The 

 Joiinial of the Jamaica As^ri 

 lulhnal Socirty (May, 1906) 

 !)>• Mr. Robert Thomson, 

 witli a view to pointing out 

 the desirability of its culti- 

 vation in Jamaica and else- 

 where. This is a species of 

 the genus Sapiiini. The spe- 

 cific name biglaiidiilosion, 

 applied to this tree by the 

 authorities at Kew, Mr. 

 Thomson considers errone- 

 ous — biglandidosiim is an- 

 other species indigenous to 

 vast expanses of tropical 

 America and is useless as a 

 commercial rubber producer. 

 Mr. Thomson notes that 

 about 22 years ago, when he 

 was establishing a large cin- 

 chona plantation on the Co- 

 lombian Andes, in the cen 

 ter of the virgen rubber re 

 gion, this rubber tree was 

 discovered and thousands 

 cut down and hundreds of 

 tons extracted, which was 

 exported mainl}- to the Unit- 

 ed States. He frequently 

 accompanied the rubber col- 



CARRYINQ RUBBER 'MILK' TO SMOKINQ PLACES. 

 MANAOS, BRAZIL. 



ESTRADA " NEAR 



fi>r cultivation. The cinchona 

 plantations established in 

 Colombia, as also those in 

 Jamaica, collapsed in view of 

 the decline in the price of 

 i|iiinine, and Mr. Thomson 

 recommended his cinchona 

 company to make a planta- 

 tion of this then newl>' dis- 

 covered virgen rubber. He, 

 therefore, planted 30,000 

 trees, several hundred to the 

 acre, with the object of thin- 

 ning them out later, and ob- 

 taining a small crop from the 

 discarded trees. I\Ir. Thom- 

 son saw little of the planta- 

 tion later, but understands 

 that " a good deal of splen- 

 did rubber has been extract- 

 ed. " At a lower level a coffee 

 planter formed a small rub- 

 ber plantation with plants 

 supplied by Mr. Thom.son. 



I'rom a cultural point of 

 view Mr. Thomson has never 

 seen a tree that nourished 

 like this rubber tree. He has 

 been introducing some of the 

 plants into Jamaica, through 

 the medium of the botanical 

 department, and reports that 

 he has received from the de- 

 partment of agriculture at 



