3«5 
Singapore Botanic Gardens towards the end of 1885 and planted 
out at the beginning of 1886. No particular attention was paid to 
these trees at the time more than to the many other economic and 
ornamental plants that were planted in this Garden that year then 
in course of foundation, and it so happened that two were planted 
side by side in poor gravelly soil on sloping ground which by the 
subsequent cutting of a new roid alongside them some years later 
converted the site on which they are growing into what is virtually 
a dry bank. When, some ten years after these trees were planted, 
the question of the best method of extracting coagulating rubber, 
and the probable yield to be expected commenced to interest the 
planting community, this tree as being the largest in the garden, 
was selected for experiments which have been continued from time 
to time and the result recorded in the Annual Reports. There is 
nothing remarkable about this tree except that, as planters have 
often remarked, it is remarkably small lor its age, but that is not 
surprising considering the nature of the soil and the situation in 
which it is growing. It is not pretended that the result of tapping 
one tree is of great value as a guide to the results to be obtained 
from a large number, for we now know from the experiments of 
Messrs. Derry, Arden, and others that there is a great dissimi- 
larity in the yield of trees of equ-d size growing side by side and 
under exactly similar condition. The interest in this particular tree 
then is that it has been tapped successively six times from the ele- 
venth to the fifteenth year of its age, that it shows no sign of de- 
terioration, that the incisions made are all healed up, and that 
the total yield of dry rubber during that period is fifteen pounds ten 
ounces, obtained by the methods which have been fully described 
in the Annual Reports, and at the following seasons : — 
Date of tapping. 
Result in dry 
rubber. 
Approximate 
age of tree 
at time of 
Remarks. 
lbs. 
oz. 
tapping. 
June 
1897 
1 | 
0 
11 Years 
Circumference at 
the time tapping 
Nov.-Decr. 
189S 
O 
0 
1 2 i , , 
commenced 36 
inches at three 
April-Mav 
1899 
2 
8 
» 3 » 
feet from the 
ground. 
Nov.-Decr. 
1899 
O 
4 
134 H 
Oct. -Nov. 
rgoo 
3 i 
12 
14 b » 
Circumference in 
December 1900, 
Aug. -Sept. 
1901 
2 
2 
15^ ■> 
66 inches. Hei- 
ght about 55 ft. 
Total... ; 
15 
10 
1 
