Rubbery Rubber!

How do we get Rubber?

How many things can you think of made of rubber? We went to a rubber plantation in the Udzungwa Mountains, Tanzania. A man showed us round and explained everything really well. It was very interesting – it is the best way to learn about rubber in a fun way!  I am now going to explain how we get rubber.

First of all, the sap (latex) is drained out of the tree. This is done with a special tool with a sharp, hooked end. A curved line is scraped in the bark. All the white sap dribbles down the line and then falls into a 1 litre cup, which is attached by string to the tree’s trunk.

Then, the sap is poured into a tray and dipped into water and acid and then laid out to dry. It is dried for two days, then it is squeezed though a mangle. It is now a sheet of rubber about 1 foot.

After that, it is dried in the sun. It is hung on long sticks in the sun. It is dried for a day until it turns brown.           

Next it is taken to a small smoke house. It is hung on sticks again, but this time it is in smoke for a day. It is really stretchy after this!

After that, the rubber pieces are stretched into long strips and hammered together into large bundles, big enough for two or three people to sit on. This bundle weighs about 50 kilograms.

Then those big bundles of rubber packed into trucks and are sold to places all around the world.

 Here are some other interesting facts about rubber…

• The little bits of dried sap that are left in the 1L cup are sometimes used to make rubber footballs
• Rubber actually really stinks!
• When it is drying in the sun, it turns brown!
• The smoke house makes the rubber sheets really stretchy, about 3 feet!
• A rubber seedling is taller than 6 feet high when it’s 2½ months old!
• A rubber tree provides rubber for 50 years
• Each rubber tree is scraped an inch every month (there can be three grooves in every inch).

Now click here to see the rubber slide show to see what all these steps look like!

Rainforest Fun in the Amazing Udzungwa Mountains!

We went to the Tanzanian rainforest for two nights last week. It was a great holiday and we had lots of fun.  We drove about 5 hours to meet our friends, the Dixons, at Hondo Hondo which is a lovely place to stay in the Udzungwa Mountains. Hondo Hondo is named after the Hondo Hondo bird. Louisa and I had our own Banda (a fancy tent) to sleep in – all by ourselves! The first night I dreamt there were crocodiles all around us and then woke up and thought it was real! There was a really huge thunderstorm in the night and the lightning made it look like daytime. It was very loud and we thought the tent might leak. Also in the night, you can hear lots of noises like frogs, monkeys and insects. And sometimes elephants walk through the camp. In the morning there was so much water everywhere that that it came up to our knees in places on the path. We had loads of fun wading and getting very wet with Elia and Finley.

Sanje Falls

We went on a long hike up a mountain to the Sanje Waterfall. It was a 6.3km walk and very steep going up. We had guide called Amini who lead us and helped us. We saw lots of monkeys swinging and screeching in the trees. They fly through the air from tree to tree. We saw the indigenous Red Colubus and Sanje Mangeby and Black and White Colubus.  We saw lots of interesting trees and plants. Many are used for medicine and our guide told us what the different leaves and bark were good for. One helps tummy aches, one for diarrhoea, one for having babies. We found a teak tree and rubbed and twisted the leaf and it turned red because of its tannins. This stops the elephants and other animals from eating it. People use it for lipstick! I tried it but it made me itchy! It also didn’t taste nice! Another interesting tree is a softwood tree which was used by the Hehe tribe a long time ago to call meetings because it makes a loud thudding noise when you bang it with a stone, which echoes through the forest. I tried it, but nobody came! We saw the poisonous antiaris toxicana tree. The sap is used for poison arrows.

We had lunch at the top of the waterfalls. We were very high up. We climbed onto the big rock at the very top and could see down the valley for miles and miles. We dipped our feet in the pools in the rock and looked over the edge. It drops 180m down! Our guide had his legs dangling right over the edge!

We went back down and swam in the pool at the bottom of the huge waterfall. We could see how high we had been before! It was really loud and there was lots of spray. It also started to rain while we were swimming.  On the way back, I walked in a path of army ants and they bit my feet. I screamed! Then Dad got bitten when he tried to help me.  Ouch!

The Nature Trail

We also went on a nature trail. We had to find 12 number logs and then look for teak (red lipstick) leaves, the strangler fig tree or elephant poo, or monkeys. It was very fun but we missed Number 7 and 10. We also got a bit lost! At first we went wrong so Ben and Mum went to see if they could see a path and then the next moment, we saw then hanging on branches like koalas! We later found out that there was a deep gully. They looked so funny! Then we found the trail and started again. We saw lots of indigenous plants and fungi and there were lots of bridges and gullies as well.

Click here for a slide show of our Rainforest Adventure.