Analysis of physical properties of wood in three species of Galician oaks for the manufacture of wine barrels Part i: Wood infradensity
The current study about physical properties of wood of Quercus robur L., Q. petraea (Matt.) Liebl., and Q. pyrenaica Willd. in Galicia (northwest of Spain) was based on the determination of proportion of sapwood, heartwood, infradensity, and porosity to understand and estimate the variation of these characteristics and/or properties in the Galician oaks. For this, it was necessary to fell several trees within the study area. In total, 45 trees were chosen in 15 different stands of provinces of Lugo and Ourense, i.e., we have obtained 45 wood slices of Quercus at 60 cm tall on the trunk of the tree, and 194 wood samples with a parallelepiped shape and dimensions of 2×2×4 cm ± 1 mm. The infradensity characterization reveals that oak wood from Galicia has a greater infradensity than French oaks, and Quercus pyrenaica has a higher infradensity than Q. robur and Q. petraea. There is a strong variation of the same based on the geographic origin, but there is almost no variation inside a plot. The global objective was to realize a detailed description on the physical properties of wood of these species for its possible use in industry cooperage. For this, the objective of this initial work was to begin with the study of wood infradensity.