and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society.— December, 1911. 563 



now in vogue which take half of the tree one 

 year and half the next, and so on. Once the 

 tree is got into sections of three, which will I 

 think generally prove to be in three years 

 in the best districts, and four years where bark 

 is thinner (or at higher elevations or in dry 

 zones) the l-3rd section will be tapped each 

 year, so that there will always be on the tree a 

 strip of bark of not less than l-3rd of its cir- 

 cumference which is at least two year old renewal 

 and the system is elastic because never more 

 than 3 cuts willjbe put on at atime so that at any 

 time a section can be gone above for another 

 year making the other sections a year older. 

 The system, therefore, has the advantage of 

 enabling a young tree to be profitably tapped 

 when 16 in. to in girth at three feet from the 

 ground, and it adapts itself to any district or 

 elevation, and the period of renewal can be ex- 

 tended from 3 years to 6 years as desired. That 

 the tapping above after the first or second year 

 makes no reduction in yield is proved by yields 

 secured fromlfields where the system is in vogue. 

 It even appears that the leaving of the untap- 

 ped section increases the yield and in any case it 

 must prove beneficial to the tree, — I am, &c., 

 J. SHERIDAN PATTERSON. 



II. 



Warwick, Ambawella, Dec. 3rd. 



Sir, — Mr Petch in his very instructive book 

 " The Physiology and Diseases of Hevea 

 Brasiliensis " says that : "the adoption of the 

 quarter system, necessitates waiting until the 

 trees are six to eight years old before a quarter 

 section is sufficiently large to be worth tapping," 

 and I consider that there is the same objection 

 to the one third section until a tree is six years 

 old any how." 



Mr Petch in referring to my system, in 

 which I get over these objections by starting on 

 half the tree in the 4th or 5th year, or when- 

 ever it is 16" in girth at three feet from the 

 ground, considers that 1 anticipate too great 

 an annual increase in girth and quotes Mr 

 Willis as stating that " no estate had reached 

 an annual average increase of four inches, and 

 the best was three-and-a-half.'' How Mr 

 Willis got his figures of all Ceylon Estates, and 

 which he considers the best, I do not know, 

 but I have received the following figures as to 

 one estate, which though they may be excep- 

 tional, support my contention as to the effect 

 of cultivation on Rubber when it is 4 to 5 years 

 old. These trees have never been tapped on 

 both sides, which may partly account for the 

 very satisfactory growth. They were tapped 

 on one side only the first year, and are being 

 tapped on 2/3rd of the remaining side in 

 the second tapping. The average rate, of 

 increase between 1909 and 1910 is given as 

 follows ; — 



No. Acres. Inches. 



1 field 48 (1905 planting) ... 4| 



2 „ 25 . . „ ..... 5 



3 ,, 16 (original figures missing) 



4 „ 25 „ ... 6 4-5 



5 „ 29 „ ~. 6 

 Also an 8-acre field increased 5 2 5 inoh— 



a 3-acre field 5 3-5 inch and an 8-acre field 6| 



inch. All these fields were manured in 1908, 

 and kept quite clean. On an adjoining estate a 

 manured plot planted in 1906, and manured in 

 19l)9, increased in girth 5 inches in 9 months, 

 at the rate of 6 2-3 inches in 12 months. I 

 quote these figures to show that anyhow on 

 some estates, with certain treatment, a 5-inch 

 annual increment in girth may be obtained in 

 the fourth, fifth and sixth years, which are all 

 that my system is concerned with. Even if the 

 increase were only 4 inches, it would not render 

 the system unsuitable, as I only tap up to 27 

 inches on the lower side of the cut and to 30 

 inches on the upper. 



Mr. Petch's second objection, is to tapping 

 for two years on one side, both as affecting the 

 food supply and the yield, I found by exper- 

 ience that there was this objection, before 

 reading Mr. Petch's criticism, and I altered the 

 system, so that in the second year I now tap 

 2-3rd of the untapped half (which is l-3rd of the 

 whole tree) only putting on two cuts as before, 

 as I find that when trees are young, the fewer 

 the cuts the better the flow continues. On 

 page 94 of his book Mr. Petch states that 

 "the greater number of wounds interferes more 

 with the flow of latex and causes a more rapid 

 diminution of yield." I proved to my own 

 satisfaction in 1908, that on old trees (say 8 to 

 12 years old) 3 cuts at the foot apart, gave prac- 

 tically as much latex as 6 cuts at the foot apart, 

 and of course the economy of bark is obvious. 

 On young trees 1 found 2 cuts gave practically 

 as much as 3 cuts. In my revised system, the 

 third year's tapping can be either above the 1st 

 year's tapping or include the still untapped sec- 

 tion according to the girth of the tree, and the 

 state of the renewed bark. My contention is, 

 that on this system, you can adapt your period 

 of renewal to local conditions, if 5 years renewal 

 is necessary, you can get 5 years. If 4 years is 

 necessary, you can get 4 years, whereas if only 3 

 years is found necessary then you have your 

 tree easily arranged into thirds. In the mean- 

 time you have been able to tap the tree profi- 

 tably without doing any harm, when only 16in 

 in girth at 3 feet. Good 5-year-old rubber tap- 

 ped on this system is yielding 150 lb per acre, 6 

 year-old rubber 200 lb and 7-year-old rubber 300 

 lb, planted mostly 15 feet by 15 or 16Jfeet by 16£. 



1 am glad to see that Mr Petch emphatically 

 condemns the use of the pricker, excepting as a 

 makeshift in such places as Hevea Brasiliensis 

 ought not to have been planted, and emphasises 

 the damage being doue by tapping one side of a 

 tree one year and the other side the next, point- 

 ing out that the damage done by such systems, 

 though not immediately apparent, will show up 

 in future years, if a long enough renewal is not 

 allowed,— I am, &c, 



J. SHERIDAN PATTERSON. 



iii. 



Dec. 7th. 



Sie,— I must say that I thiuk Mr. Sheridan 

 Patterson deserves the thanks of the Rubber- 

 planting community for publishing the results 

 of his observations and experience in con- 

 nection with hia improved system of tapping 



