Every wood anatomist knows that the wood near the center of a tree (juvenile wood) differs from the wood laid down at some distance from the pith (mature wood), and that the wood produced during the spring (earlywood) differs from the wood produced during the summer (latewood). There is a...
Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco), a shade intolerant species, and western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla (Raf.) Sarg.), a shade tolerant species, were compared to learn more about the temporal pattern of release from suppression in both species, whether hydraulic architecture or photosynthetic capacity constrain release and how wood functional properties change...
Intensive management of young-growth Douglas-fir plantations has emphasized volume growth over wood quality. A better understanding of the variables that affect wood quality is needed so that wood quality and stand yield can be systematically combined into a silviculture program. This experiment utilized two separate experiments to establish the relationship...
To learn the effect of wind on a species native to a windy site, I compared germination, seedling survival, seedling form, and the force required to uproot seedlings in a wind-exposed and a wind-sheltered site. In February 1992, the sand dune perennial Lupinus arboreus Sims. was planted in wind-exposed and...
Xylem is nonuniform in its structure and function throughout the plant stem. Xylem structure varies from pith to bark, from root to apical meristem, from stem to branch, at nodes vs internodes, and at junctions of branches, stems or roots compared to the internodal regions nearby. At smaller scales, anatomy...
Because of different mechanical constraints on vines and self-supporting plants, vines are thought to differ from trees and shrubs in a variety of their growth characteristics. I tested the hypotheses that vines grow faster than shrubs and that supported shoots have delayed leaf expansion relative to stem elongation, using western...
To learn whether vine stems are less structurally stable than shrub stems, I studied the architecture, anatomy, and mechanics of western poison oak (Toxicodendron diversilobum), a plant that grows as a vine when provided with external support but otherwise as a shrub. I assessed the relative structural stabilities of vines...
Longitudinal growth strains develop in woody tissues during cell-wall formation. This study compares stems, which have a mechanical role and experience longitudinal stresses, and nonstructural roots, which have little mechanical role and experience few or no longitudinal stresses, to test the hypothesis that growth strains are produced in stems of...
This paper hypothesizes a correlation in some species between the cambial age of transition from core (juvenile) to outer (mature) wood and the cambial age of transition from photosynthetic to non-photosynthetic bark. Secondly, this paper hypothesizes that the relationship is causal: a signal produced in relation to the photosynthetic bark...
The relationships between leaf area and sapwood and inner bark quantities (widths, areas, and volumes) were studied in an attempt to understand the design criteria for sapwood quantity in eighteen 34-year-old Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) trees with a wide range of leaf areas, sapwood areas, and dry masses of leaf, xylem,...