ACACIA
Acacia Gum
Gum Arabic

DESCRIPTION

All the gum-yielding Acacias exhibit
the same habit and general appearance,
differing only in technical characters.

They are spiny shrubs or small trees,
preferring sandy or sterile regions, with the climate
dry during the greater part of the year.

Gum harvest from the various species
lasts about five weeks.

About the middle of November, after the rainy season,
it exudes spontaneously from the trunk and principal
branches, but the flow is generally stimulated by incisions
in the bark, a thin strip, 2 to 3 feet in length and 1 to 3
inches wide being torn off.

In about fifteen days it thickens in the furrow down
which it runs, hardening on exposure to the air,
usually in the form of round or oval tears,
about the size of a pigeon's egg, but sometimes
in vermicular forms, white or red, according
to whether the species is a white or red gum tree.

About the middle of December,
the Moors commence the harvesting.

Masses of gum are collected, either while adhering
to the bark, or after it falls to the ground, the entire
product, often of various species, thus collected,
is packed in baskets and very large sacks
of tanned leather and brought on camels and bullocks
to the centres of accumulation and then
to the points of export, chiefly Suakin,
Alexandria, or - in Senegambia - St. Louis.

It is then known as 'Acacia sorts,'
the term being equivalent to 'unassorted Acacia.'
Unsorted gums show the widest variation as to size
of fragments, whiteness, clearness,
freedom from adhering matter, etc.

It is next sorted or 'picked'
in accordance with these differences.

There are many kinds of Acacia Gum in commerce:
acacia glaucophylla (Staud.) and acacia abyssinica (Hochst)
Said to yield an equally good gum,
but little of it is believed to reach the market.

acacia arabica
acacia abyssinica
acacia catechu
acacia glaucophylla
acacia gummifera
acacia nilotica
acacia senegal