444 
expected with a climate so humid and with an equable rainfall the 
normal condition is but seldom obtained. In this respect the year 
of Report (1905) is the best example. During February and March 
only 300 seeds were collected and as these months represent the 
winter or dormant period it will be inferred, as did occur, theie was 
a heavy leaf fall and a better than usual resting period so necessary 
for a heavy or exhaustive autumn crop which ripens about six months 
after the flowers appear. The direct effect of a heavy rainfall or the 
necessity of very little rain at the foliar periodicity is shown in the 
following tables : — 
1904 
i9°5 
i 9 °5 
i 9°5 
1906 
1906 
Rainfall. 
: December 9*98 
: January 5 '28 
: February 579 
Total 21*05 
Rainfall. 
: December 9*46 
: January 16*87 
: February 5 ‘^° 
Total 32*13 
Fruit Crop. 
1905 : August 
September 
October 
Total 
Fruit Crop. 
1906: August 
September 
October 
Total 
* 9 ° 5 - 
60,050 Seeds 
86,600 do. 
37,000 do. 
184,450 Seeds. 
1906, 
12,175 Seeds 
64,900 do. 
15,720 do. 
92,795 Seeds. 
It must be remarked that the paucity of fruit crop is not the true 
expression of the effects of climatic conditions on all the functions 
of the trees and their variability or activity throughout the year as 
the fruit crop may be marred at the time of pollination by the 
physical agency of heavy rain showers. 
No better instance of rain damage could be cited than in the case 
of the durian {Durio sibethinus). In Malaya it is common know- 
ledge that a heavy rain shower at the time of pollination seriously 
affects the prospective crop and continuous ram utter y destroys it. 
The duriam too P furnishes a good example of variability. Severn 
years may pass with only one flowering period f "^d ‘las'uulv and 
d urine the current year, when a good crop was ripened last Ju y 
Auenft profuse flowers were produced the following September 
nearly all of which in the vicinity of the Botanic Gardens were lost 
through heavy rains. 
Hevea braziliensis is a monoecious tree, with male a T, 
flowers on the same panicle or rather “ m Pound cyme. The male 
flowers are vastly more numerous than the female, which a 
•finely on the sibterminal branchlet of each cyme branch The 
female flower opens first and remains attached to its pedicel. The 
off completely from the pedicels after d / scha ^ e vv ^.^ e s ^ ted ; 
flowers are all yellow, and very strongly an y 
