16 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



THF FXPERIMFNTS IN TAPPING 



The American methods of collecting storax are not standardized. 

 Field experiments to determine production costs and methods that 

 would permit the domestic product to compete with the imported 

 material were planned and conducted by Dr. S. A. Mahood, chemist 

 at the Forest Products Laboratory, in cooperation with Mr. B. E. 

 Needham, of Lottie, Louisiana. Trees growing on land owned by 

 Mr. Needham, north of Elliott City, Louisiana, were used in the work. 

 The land was low, more or less swampy, and subject to occasional 

 overflow. The timber formed a rather heavy stand of second growth 

 material, consisting chiefly of red gum varying from 10 inches to 2iX 

 feet in size, and of ash and water oak with an undergrowth of black- 

 berry brier. Although attempts had been made to obtain storax by 

 extracting red gum bark, leaves, and twigs, and mill waste with sol- 

 vents, negative results had been obtained owing to the fact that the 

 storax of commerce is a pathological product formed in the living 

 sapwood of the tree as a response to injuries or wounds. 



Three methods of obtaining the gum were compared in this experi- 

 ment. Fifty trees were used. Ten trees were "deadened" or 

 girdled by removing a strip of bark several inches wide from the 

 entire circumference of the tree. Twenty trees were tapped by 

 cutting four perpendicular streaks 3 feet in length on each with a 

 turpentine hack. The scars were about one-half inch in width and 

 extended into the sapwood. Twenty trees Avere tapped by making 

 several approximately horizontal streaks 4 inches apart, so that the 

 total length of the exposed surface was the same as in the perpen- 

 dicular scars. Half of the horizontal taps had a north and half a 

 south exposure, and the vertical taps were placed approximately at 

 the four points of the compass, but little or no effect was noted as 

 a result. 



The trees were tapped on May 30, 1919, and gum was collected * on 

 June 10 and 21, July 10, August 2 and 15, September 10, October 4, 

 and November 14. 



THF YIELDS OF STORAX OBTAINED ^ 



The exuded gum was collected by scraping" the surfaces of the taps 

 with a blunt case knife. This was the only means used to freshen the 

 surfaces of the wounds. It was thought that -in future, with more 



