690 RUBBER 



to remove all the small, badly grown trees and those 

 which have been broken by wind or damaged by animals 

 or disease. In the following years the smallest trees are 

 again removed, and, after tapping has commenced, all 

 the poor latex yielders, until the requisite number of trees 

 per acre is arrived at, usually 150 to 200. All the trees 

 removed are pulled out by the roots with a jack and 

 burned. This method of thinning finally leaves the 

 permanent trees irregularly spaced, but that does not 

 matter. If a regular system of thinning is adopted by 

 removing every other tree, or every other row, it is 

 bound to happen that some good trees are removed and 

 poor ones left, and no method of selection can be used. 



Many of the trees can be tapped when they are 3 to 

 4 years old, but we have come to the conclusion in Coorg 

 that it is not advisable to start tapping on young trees, 

 and we wait until they are 5 or 6 years old and the bark 

 is fairly thick. As would be expected, the older and 

 more mature the tree the better the yield, and the higher 

 the quality of the rubber obtained. Some of the oldest 

 trees give as much as 2 and 3 Ib. of rubber per annum. 



In the early days of Ceara rubber great difficulty was 

 experienced with the extraction of latex from the trees. 

 When tapped in the same way as Hevea rubber the bark 

 rotted, and so many of the trees died that the industry 

 proved unprofitable. This difficulty was overcome by 

 using a tapping system in which a separate cut was made 

 at each tapping occasion a system introduced with 

 success by Mr. Westland in Ceylon in 1909. This system 

 was experimented with and elaborated on estates in 

 Coorg during 1910, and it has proved there the best 

 method of handling young trees. 



The system finally adopted after numerous experiments 

 is first to strip the outer bark, which is tough and 

 leathery, off that section of the tree which is to be tapped, 

 usually one-third of the circumference, and then to cut 

 a shallow vertical channel down the centre of this area 

 to act as a conducting channel for the latex to the collect- 

 ing cup at the base of the tree. Having made this 

 channel, a number of sloping cuts are made with either 

 a Pask V knife, or a knife like that of a farrier, in either 



