Do Rubber Trees (Hevea brasiliensis) survive pollarding?

Hi all,

even living in Thailand with a lot of rubber plantations I actually have never seen anyone pollarding the tree back to lets say 1.5m.
Will the rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) die or will it regrow? Looking at the cuts made for tapping Latex there are never coming new branches which lets me indicate if I would chop the top of its dead is signed.

We want to convert the rubber plantation into a food forest and after thinking all ways to safe at least a few of these (4500) rubber trees it looks to me at first glance that the stem as such could serve as living poles (discourage termites) for electric fences around our rotational pasture parcels and if they really regrow their lower canopy even could serve as a snack for our planned goats.

This would put a lot of unwanted trees into a new multiple use because they have just the right space for fence posts.

Has anyone ever chopped a Hevea brasiliensis at the mid level of its trunk?

Cheers for any reply.

Well, you could try the experiment with just one -- one that you wouldn't mind losing if it turns out not to work.

Did you try pollarding one? What was the outcome? I live in Vietnam and there is a plantation right next to me. I have seen a couple that were "pollarded" by wind but there was just 1 or 2 new growths from the man trunk. When the trees start to die they are quickly consumed by termites so using them as poles, for anything, is not a good idea.

Since we visited the land that was offered we lost all interest.
The Trees were 10 years old and had grown to a size that would be in any fertile ground be a tree of 5 years.

The ground was solid clay and not as described by the owner as loam.

But yes we did some trials on land of my wife's family.
There were two random grown Rubber trees.

A big one about 6" trunk died after pollarding, but the cut was made in the middle of the trunk, half way between ground and first branches.

the 2nd was about 4" trunk diameter and we cut it right below the branches.
At that level one strong new branch grew out and two others died back after a few weeks, so it seems that there was still a few active nodes.

But I would say this was a proof that rubber trees do not like pollarding.
There were nodes enough but after 3 new green twigs popped out, only one came to life and that one was from the begin the dominant one.

If you would pollard the branches all, I have no idea how that would be working out but looking at the nodes I would say the outcome would be the same. Some dominant branches would regrow and take the power for others to survive.

I have actually made the opposite experience: rubber trees really like pollarding! For background: My wife and I bought a former rubber tree plantation, where the rubber trees were felled prior to the land sale. However some of the trees came back to life. After a few years I cutsome of them at a height of ca. 1m. In most cases, the result was a vigorous regrowth. We also have a couple of smaller rubber trees in the roadside ditch, which are cut in a random way at least once per year - they all produce happy regrowth.

Our land has sandy soil and the rubber trees get maximal sunshine - maybe (or maybe not) this can explain our differing experiences.