Gums, Resins, 



m 



It is these various practices that have so rapidly narrowed the native 

 sources of rubber. They are all due to the fact that so much more rubber is 

 available from certain trees and plants by other means than tapping ; the " root 

 rubber" could not be obtained at all by tapping. Before cultivation was intro- 

 duced it seemed likely that in time only the Hevea species would be left as the 

 world's ultimate dependence, as these are invariably tapped, even in the most 

 remote forests. Under cultivation, however, the Castilloa, Kickxia, and some 

 other species are capable of being tapped successfully, but there remain a number 

 of other plants, valuable for rubber, which are not likely to yield at a profit 

 without the destruction of the plants. 



There is thus suggested a much wider field for the scientific processes lately 

 introduced in Mexico than in merely exploiting Guayule rubber. If the Landolphia 

 climbers, for example, must be sacrificed, their yield ought to be largely increased, 

 by scientific methods, over what is now obtained by the rude practices of the 

 Congolese. It may be that some of the species not capable of being tapped will 

 yet be cultivated extensively, with a view to destroying the plants and the final 

 systematic extraction of all the rubber they contain. It would not be surprising 

 if the owners of some of these processes, in the hunger for rubber, should even 

 acquire plantations of trees capable of being tapped, in order to gain an immediate 

 large return. No doubt the widespread success of the new scientific treatment here 

 referred to will temporarily increase the output of rubber from certain sections, 

 but it will only hasten the destruction of existing rubber-yielding plants. In any 

 event the rubber planting interest of to-day has nothing to fear from the new 

 condition ; it may yet be the means of opening a new field for profitable planting. 



It has been asserted, though of course accurate data are lacking, that more 

 rubber can be obtained from a five-year old tree by cutting it down and extracting 

 all the latex than by tapping it for five consecutive years. The question may 

 occur to some people, therefore : Why not do it, and replant ? 



There has been much condemnation of the wholesale destruction of wild 

 rubber trees in Central and South America, whereby the unlettered natives have 

 gained so much rubber. What will be said if scientific rubber hunters in the near 

 future sweep over those countries, buying rubber plantations only to grind up 

 the trees, and scouring forests for other latex bearers, every shred of which will 

 disappear in the capacious maw of an extracting machine? But such a proceeding 

 need not be viewed with horror. The main thing is to get rubber, and to get it 

 quickly. The trees are not sacred, but only the rubber in them. Why not get it 

 out, and in use, and replant fast enough to more than make up for what are 

 destroyed ? — India Rubber* World, June, 1906. 



