TAPPING 167 



away by the half-spiral single cut before described. Yet it 

 will be admitted to be very moderate tapping, and probably, 

 if sufficient distance is allowed between the cuts, say eighteen 

 inches, there is nothing better. In any case it seems abun- 

 dantly evident that tapping has hitherto been generally on 

 wrong lines. From every point of view the health of the 

 trees, the proper renewal of the bark, the best returns of latex, 

 the lowest tapping-costs, the least labour involved and the 

 securing of the largest proportion of first-grade latex rubber 

 and the lowest possible proportion of bark-shaving rubber 

 such a system is to be recommended. 



The feature which one notices about nearly all the tapping 

 experiments recorded in the various volumes heretofore pub- 

 lished is that they are quite inconclusive. They have been 

 conducted on extremely limited numbers of trees for extremely 

 limited periods of time. At least 500 trees should be simul- 

 taneously experimented upon for each system of tapping it 

 is intended to contrast. 



To take only about twenty trees, and to experiment with 

 three or four systems of tapping for a week or a month, or two 

 months at most, does not give any conclusive data. In such a 

 small number of trees there are bound to be great inequality 

 in the yields among the trees, while the number employed is 

 too small to average down to a fair proportion. Everyone 

 knows that among, say, twenty trees of fairly-advanced age 

 there are some which are much better milkers than others. 

 Such trees might well give better results with a wrong system 

 of tapping than poorer trees with a better system, so that the 

 results arrived at when experimenting with a very limited 

 number of trees can scarcely be considered of any great value. 



It is most desirable that some planter of standing, whose 

 name would carry weight, should experiment for a period of at 

 least six months twelve months would be even better with 

 equal blocks of 500 or 1000 trees. He should try the broad 

 V system, and the half-spiral, one cut. Against these he should 

 try the half-herring-bone and the full-herring-bone with vary- 

 ing numbers of cuts, and any modification in the way of daily 

 or weekly tapping that suggested itself. The total daily yields 

 of latex for each set of 500 or 1000 trees should be carefully 

 kept till the final total was arrived at. It would also be 



