50 GUTTA CULTIVATION. 



In the Singapore Free Press of the 17th April, 1896 

 the followiug advertisemeut appeared : — 



" Messrs. Chasseriau Bros, having received fresh heavy orders for dry 

 gutta percha leaves want to buy a large quantity of same (up to 1,000 

 pikuls per month.) Apply to C. Favre & Co." April IGth. 



On api>licatiou I was informed by Messrs. C. Favre & Co. 

 that they were ready to buy 1,000 pikuls or more per month, for 

 an unlimited time, of quite dry leaves, without branches, of 

 Dichopsis gutta (G-etah taban merah or G-etah taban sutra) at 

 $4 per piliul net, delivered at their store in Singapore.* The 

 price would appear to be quite as high as it is possible to pay, 

 but it does not seem to be sufficient to cover the expenses of 

 collection except where wages are low. It has to be borne in 

 mind that the trees only occur at rare and qu.ite uncertain 

 intervals in the jungle, that the leaves are all at the top of the 

 tree, often at 80 to 100 feet above the ground, that one pikul of 

 dry leaf means the collection and transport out of the jungle of 

 at least three pikuls of fresh leaf, that green leaf will not stand 

 baling for more than a few hours, or it heats and becomes offen- 

 sive, that to dry a large quantity of leaves some sort of barbacue 

 and large drying sheds, in wet weather, would be necessary, 

 and that there would be great difficulty in preventing the 

 collectors from mixing the leaves of inferior kinds of guttas 

 with the bulk, and so spoiling the quality of the gum extracted 

 from them.f 



It has been urged in the correspondence already quoted, 

 that it wovild not pay to separate the gvitta because such a large 

 amount of useless material would have to be treated, but other 

 crops of which the same might be said are successfully dealt 

 with. Indigo and sugar are well known instances in point. 

 The yield of the former isjstated to be 4/10 ths per cent, and of 

 the latter 12 per cent of the weight of the plants. In the case 

 of gutta the amovmt in fresh bark is about 6 per cent, and 

 in the leaves about 2^ per cent. The bark from the trunk 

 of the trees was found, by a number of experiments, to lose 

 on an average 50 per cent of its weight in drying. The bark of 



* In a subsequent letter, dated the 7th September, Messrs. Favre & Co. offer to buy 

 3,000 pikuls per month at $4.50 per pikul on board at Singapore. 



tl hear, since this paper has been in the printer's hands, on what appears to be good 

 authority, that the Agents in Singapore have stojjped buying the leaf, the reason being 

 that there is no sale for the gutta percha extracted liy tlie bisuljihide of carbon process. 

 At first manufactui'ers bought il readily, \>nt on attemiiting to work it up found it to be of 

 very inferior quabty. This is doubtless due to tl\e causes mentioned in the body of the 

 paper, i.e., conversion of part of the gutta perclia into resin in the tissues of the leaves 

 during the time which elapses between collecting them and extraction in Europe. It is 

 also quite possil)le that the process itself may have a deleterious ellect on the gum. 



