84 



FIGURE 30^. 



Sketch showing tapping of 

 renewed bark. 



long enough. It is, however, open to question, whether 

 this point of view is entirely exact; a single instance, 

 which tends to show that the age of the tree has some 

 influence in the matter may be mentioned here. On one 



estate, I saw Hevea which 

 was originally planted between 

 coffee, near to another Hevea 

 plantation on virgin soil ; the 

 former trees were much infe- 

 rior in girth to the trees on 

 virgin soil, but according to 

 the manager, their production 

 of rubber was in no way 

 behindhand. On the same 

 a estate, in a row of old Hevea 

 trees, there was one among 

 them which was remarkably 

 thicker than the rest; its 

 production of rubber, however 

 did not exceed that of the 

 others. Generally the age is 

 also taken into consideration 

 and trees which are younger 

 than four or five years are not 

 touched, even when the girth 

 is sufficient ; the reason for 

 this, however, lying more in 

 the fact that in a plantation 



of this age the amount of the trees suitable for tapping 

 is too small. 



In such cases, of course, not only the manager's views 

 are decisive, but also the financial position of the estate 



If at the second tapping, the cut is 



made in the direction of the 



dotted line, the older bark 



will be found at a. 



