390 
FICUS ELASTIC A. 
I have just tapped a tree and got 5 ozs. rubber first time, 2% ozs. 
second time. The tree is now dry. Age 4 years and 1 month. 
I think we can safely calculate on getting half a pound per tree in 
the sixth vear. I should like to know if you are able to ofive me 
any information about any trees tapped at that age or near it. 
F. A. CALLOWAY, 
Bukit Rajah Estate, KJang. 
(Can any correspondent give additional results on tapping Ficus 
elastica. Ed.) 
ON THE CULTIVATION OF RICE AS A 
CATCH CROP. 
I have been asked to make some notes on the above subject for 
the “ Bulletin ” but 1 can only pretend to give our own experience, 
(Lanadron Estate, Muar) based upon our harvest under a system 
which may or may not be applicable to other districts. In a coun- 
try where the natural conditions are favourable for the cultivation 
of rice and where the amount produced is only an infinitesimal 
portion of that which is consumed, it seems to offer a good channel 
for energy and enterprise. But there are many difficulties natural 
and otherwise which have to be overcome and unless grown with 
other crops I cannot see how an European could succeed, f must 
mention that my remarks apply to “hill-paddy ” only. To succeed 
it must be planted on a fairly large scale otherwise rats and birds do 
a great deal of damage. Then the handling involves a great deal 
of labour and unless the crop is large enough to warrant the use 
of handling and treating facilities , it entails too great an expense. 
1 will endeavour to explain our “modus operandf” in the hopes 
that it may be of interest to some of the readers of the Bulletin. 
First of all we select suitable fields, those that have little or no 
shade, supply the weeding contractor with nine tins (45 gantangs) 
of selected paddy seed with which he plants up the ten acre block 
and as he has a half interest in the crop, with very few exceptions 
the work is well done. Planting entails some expense as it requires 
a batch of men to plant up a field, but. the contractor has to arrange 
for this. After about five months the harvesting commences and 
here a difficulty presents itself in consequence of the antiquated 
method of gathering, each ear of ripe grain being snipped off, one 
by one, with a small circular knife, after which the grain is thrash- 
ed by treading under foot and then winnowed in the usual primi- 
tive way. Last season this work entailed an extra hundred hands 
for the three hundred acres under cultivation and thev were paid 
in paddy, vis., one-fifth of that which they gathered. This season 
we have made arrangements to reduce this waste of labour bv con- 
structing small hand thrashing machines. The crop will be reaped 
with a “sabit or reaping hook and the stalks put into the ma- 
