Table Of ContentFlavio Ruffi natto · Alan Crivellaro
Atlas of
Macroscopic Wood
Identifi cation
With a Special Focus on Timbers Used
in Europe and CITES-listed Species
Atlas of Macroscopic Wood Identification
Flavio Ruffinatto • Alan Crivellaro
Atlas of Macroscopic Wood
Identification
With a Special Focus on Timbers Used in
Europe and CITES-listed Species
Flavio Ruffinatto Alan Crivellaro
Department TeSAF Department of Geography
University of Padova University of Cambridge
Legnaro, IT Cambridge, UK
ISBN 978-3-030-23565-9 ISBN 978-3-030-23566-6 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23566-6
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019
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Acknowledgments
We hereby acknowledge the following people and organizations for providing specimens for
this book: Hans Beeckman (Royal Museum for Central Africa, Tervuren, Belgium), Nicola
Macchioni (IBE-CNR, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy), Alex C. Wiedenhoeft (USDA Forest Products
Laboratory, Madison, WI, USA). The University of Padova (Italy), Department of Land,
Environment, Agriculture and Forestry (TESAF), provided financial support.
v
Contents
Part I B asics of Wood Structure, Materials and Methods, Identification Key
1 Plans of Observation and Wood Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2 Specimen Preparation and Observation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
3 Materials and Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4 Definition of Macroscopic Characters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
5 Identification Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Part II W ood Specifications
6 Wood Specifications A–B . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
7 Wood Specifications C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
8 Wood Specifications D . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .141
9 Wood Specifications E–J . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .183
10 Wood Specifications K–N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .237
11 Wood Specifications O–P . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .287
12 Wood Specifications Q–S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .343
13 Wood Specifications T–Z . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .385
List of Described Species Sorted by Family . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .417
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .423
vii
Introduction
Wood identification is a subject of interest in several fields: forestry, wood industry, cultural
heritage, civil and criminal forensics, chain of custody verification and archaeology, just to
name some. Interest in this tool has been increasingly growing in the field of global timber
trade control, driven by laws and regulations aimed at tackling international illegal logging and
promoting global forest species protection: CITES, Canadian Wild Animal and Plant Protection
and Regulation of International and Interprovincial Trade Act (1992), US Lacey Act (amended
2008), EU Timber Regulation (2010) and Australian Illegal Logging Prohibition Act (2012).
Wood identification in fact is one of the crucial steps to verify timber legality and it is typically
one of the first applied to wood products (Dormont et al. 2015). Currently, wood identification
is mainly performed through microscopic analysis, a time-consuming and highly specialised
laboratory-based practice, which requires a lot of training and access to specific equipment and
reference collections. Since a few years other methods, such as near-infrared spectroscopy,
extractive analysis and DNA analysis, have started to be employed in wood identification, but
their applicability is still to be fully assessed and access to most of these techniques is likely to
be restricted to specialised laboratories as well. The first stage of wood identification, however,
is not represented by specialised laboratories, but by people acting on the field. A border agent
operating in a harbour, for instance, might determine the illegality of a shipment of wood
directly in situ by visual inspection.
In the last few decades, wood anatomists started to develop tools based on macroscopic and
non-anatomical rather than microscopic wood characters. Different macroscopic wood identi-
fication products have been released, including books, scientific papers, laboratory identifica-
tion manuals, field identification manuals, pamphlets, posters and a range of electronic media,
including electronic copies of paper publications and interactive software keys and atlases.
Some of these products cover general wood identification (FPPRL 1952; Hoadley 1990; Ilic
1990; Richter and Oelker 2002), others include CITES-listed timber species (CITES 2002;
USDA-APHIS-PPQ 2006; Garrett et al. 2010; Richter et al. 2014) and others focus on regional
commercial timber species (Benoit and Dirol 2000; Safdari et al. 2008; Safdari and Devall
2009; Coradin et al. 2010; Wiedenhoeft 2011). An even broader body of literature from ear-
lier decades, much of which is restricted to individual countries, states or provinces, already
exists. However, despite the large number of published products, a standard macroscopic
features terminology has been long lacking, with the consequent fragmentation and reduced
efficacy of the above-listed efforts. Moreover, some electronic media are no longer running on
modern computers. Only recently, following the path of the IAWA (International Association
of Wood Anatomists) lists of microscopic features for hardwood and softwood identification
(IAWA Committee 1989, IAWA Committee 2004), Ruffinatto et al. (2015) contributed to fill
the gap by publishing a proposed list of macroscopic features for hardwood and softwood
identification.
With this atlas the authors finally put into practice the aforementioned list by describing 335
wood species commonly introduced in the European timber market from all over the world and
by providing identification keys for their identification. Overall 292 different genera are repre-
sented, including CITES-listed timbers. Each wood description includes a low-magnification
(10×) photograph of the transverse surface, a list of its macroscopic characters as well as
ix
x Introduction
information about physical and mechanical properties, natural durability, end uses, environ-
mental sustainability and possible related misleading commercial names. Furthermore, each
genus is described in terms of number of species, geographical distribution and main commer-
cial timbers, and details are given about to what extent timbers within the genus can be typi-
cally identified through macroscopic and microscopic analysis, if any.
The atlas will be a valuable guide for all the agents in charge for timber verification, as those
involved in the European Timber Regulation enforcement and CITES inspections, as well as
for wood scientists, foresters, wood sellers, wood restorers and any wood worker and wood
passionate interested in a fast and reliable tool for wood identification.
References
Benoit Y, Dirol D (2000) Le coffret de reconnaissance de bois de France. In: Edition Eyrolles,
Centre Technique du bois et de l’ameublement (CTBA). France, Paris
CITES (2002) CITES Identification Guide—Tropical Woods. Wildlife Enforcement and
Intelligence Division, Enforcement Branch, Environment Canada. Environment Canada,
Ottawa
Coradin VTR, Camargos JAA, Pastore TCM, Christo AG (2010) Madeiras Comerciais do
Brasil: chave interativa de identificação baseada em caracteres gerais e macroscópicos
Dormont EE, Boner M, Braun B, Breulmann G, Degen B, Espinoza E, Gardner S, Guillery P,
Hermanson JC, Kock G, Lee SL, Kanashiro M, Rimbawanto A, Thomas D, Wiedenhoeft
AC, Yin Y, Zahnen J, Lowe AJ (2015) Forensic timber identifications: It’s time to integrate
disciplines to combat illegal logging. Biol Conserv 191:790–798
FPRL (1952) Identification of hardwoods. A lens key. H.M. Stationery Office, London
Garrett L, McGough N, Groves M, Clarke G (2010) CITES & Timber: Ramin. Royal Botanic
Gardens, Kew
Hoadley RB (1990) Identifying wood: accurate results with simple tools. The Taunton Press,
Newtown, CT
IAWA Committee (1989) IAWA list of microscopic features for hardwood identification.
IAWA Bull. n.s. 10:219–332
IAWA Committee (2004) IAWA list of microscopic features for softwood identification. IAWA
J 25:1–70
Ilic J (1990) CSIRO Macro key for hardwood identification. CSIRO, Highett
Richter HG, Gembruch K, Koch G (2014) 2014 onwards. CITESwoodID: descriptions, illus-
trations, identification, and information retrieval. In English, French, German, and Spanish.
Version: 19th February 2014
Richter HG, Oelker M (2002) 2002 onwards. MacroHOLZdata Commercial timbers: descrip-
tions, illustrations, identification, and information retrieval. In English and German. Version:
October 2002
Ruffinatto F, Crivellaro A, Wiedenhoeft AC (2015) Review of macroscopic features for hard-
wood and softwood identification and a proposal for a new character list. IAWA J
36(2):208–241
Safdari V, Ahmed M, Palmer J, Baig MB (2008) Identification of Iranian commercial wood
with hand lens. Pak J Bot 40:1851–1864
Safdari V, Devall MS (2009) Elementary software for the hand lens identification of some
common Iranian woods. IAWA J 30:81–86
USDA-APHIS-PPQ (2006) CITES I-II-III Timber species manual.
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/wps/portal/aphis/ourfocus/planthealth?1dmy&urile=wcm%3a
path%3a%2Faphis_content_library%2Fsa_our_focus%2Fsa_plant_health%2Fsa_
manuals%2Fct_online_manuals
Wiedenhoeft AC (2011) Identificación de las Especies Maderables de Centroamérica.
Identification of Central American Woods. Forest Products Society, Madison, WI
Part I
Basics of Wood Structure, Materials
and Methods, Identification Key
Plans of Observation and Wood 1
Structure
Plans of Observation
The definition of wood can vary depending on the context:
from a botanical point of view wood is the product of the
secondary growth of a plant, but not all plants produce wood
that can be employed as a material. To accomplish the practi-
cal aim of this book, wood can be defined as “the material
that under the bark constitutes the stem of a tree”.
Let us think of a piece of wood as a solid of any given
shape cut from a cylinder (the stem). The first thing we need
to do when examining a specimen is to orientate it with
respect to its original position in the cylinder, i.e. to under-
stand along which planes it has been cut from the stem.
There are three anatomical planes of reference: transverse,
longitudinal radial and longitudinal tangential. The trans-
Fig. 1.1 Anatomical planes of reference in wood: transverse (A), lon-
verse plane is perpendicular to the cylinder longitudinal axis;
gitudinal radial (B) and longitudinal tangential (C)
it is the plane across which a tree is cut when felled by a log-
ger. Both the longitudinal planes are parallel to the cylinder
longitudinal axis; they are the planes across which a board is
cut from a log in a sawmill. Having the cylinder circumfer-
ence as reference, a longitudinal plane is radial if cut along
the direction of a ray, and tangential if cut along the direction
parallel to a tangent (not following a ray) (Fig. 1.1). Each
face of a piece of wood will be cut along one of the above-
mentioned planes or any possible intermediate one, but only
the former ones are suitable to perform wood identification
(see section “Wood Structure”). More precisely, most of the
characters for macroscopic identification are on the trans-
verse surface.
By observing a whole transverse section of a trunk, in
some species it is possible to distinguish two parts with dif-
ferent colours: a darker innermost portion, called heartwood,
and a lighter outer portion close to the bark, called sapwood,
corresponding to the wood of most recent formation. Other
species instead do not show any colour difference between
Fig. 1.2 Trunk transverse sections, some of which show difference
sapwood and heartwood (Fig. 1.2). By a closer analysis it is between heartwood and sapwood colour (A), while others don’t (B)
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019 3
F. Ruffinatto, A. Crivellaro, Atlas of Macroscopic Wood Identification, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23566-6_1
