i68 THE RUBBER TREE BOOK 



essential that the total amount of bark excised should be 

 carefully calculated at the end of the period and the condition 

 of the trees reported upon. 



Such information would be of the very highest value, and 

 would quite outweigh anything hitherto recorded. 



If trees in tapping are not too widely scattered, a coolie 

 ought to be able to overtake the tapping of from 250 to 300 

 trees per day. The number overtaken of course depends 

 largely on the number of cuts the coolie has to make on each 

 tree and whether tapping is on one side or both sides of the 

 trunk. Sometimes the tappers have attendants to carry water, 

 place the cups, and cleanse them and the spouts of any dirt, 

 and this of course is a saving of time to the tapper and enables 

 him to make more cuts. It is most usual, however, for tappers 

 to work single-handed. 



Scrupulous cleanliness should always be insisted on with 

 regard to all vessels for containing latex, and in the factory 

 itself, but all these precautions are, to a large extent, wasted 

 if coolies are allowed to draw dirty water from ditches for the 

 purposes of tapping operations. This is, unfortunately, far 

 too common a practice, and is not only the means of introducing 

 many impurities into the rubber, but is often the contributory 

 cause of red spots and tackiness in the manufactured rubber. 

 There is, however, no necessity to use water for tapping opera- 

 tions. It is a bad practice and should be abandoned. The 

 use of water in tapping does not reduce the amount of scrap 

 rubber, as very many imagine, but has quite the contrary 

 effect. There is far more chance of fermentation and discolora- 

 tion of the rubber when water is used than when it is not used. 



Tapping-costs, inclusive of tools and utensils, should not 

 exceed fivepence to sixpence per pound on a young estate with 

 about 250 acres in bearing, and this ought to be reduced as 

 more rubber comes in. On an excellently-managed estate in 

 the Bila district in Sumatra the tapping-costs have recently 

 been brought down to twopence farthing per pound, which is 

 probably a record figure, and, of course, could only be achieved 

 with a high yield of latex from each tree in tapping. 



It is, however, not reasonable to conclude that a manager 

 is inefficient because tapping-costs are high in initial stages. 

 The cost of tapping utensils of all sorts, and the marking of 



