GENETIC-CONTROL OF WOOD COLOR, DENSITY AND HEARTWOOD ELLAGITANNIN CONCENTRATION IN EUROPEAN OAK (QUERCUS-PETRAEA AND QUERCUS-ROBUR)

Pressler cores of young clones of Quercus petraea and Q. robur were an alysed from two sites in Germany. Variation of wood colour (defined by the CIELAB system), density and heartwood ellagitannins was examined between clones, species and sites. Similar studies were made of cores from another trial of 20 half-sib families of parent trees deriving fr om five German forests. The results from both the clonal and progeny t rials indicate that heartwood ellagitannin content and wood density ar e under strong genetic control, while sapwood and heartwood colour are less so. A large proportion of between-clone variation in wood densit y and ellagitannin levels occurred between the two species, while thes e properties varied little among ramets of the same clone grown on two contrasting sites, despite a difference in growth rates. A large prop ortion of the total variation among progeny was attributed to forest o rigins and could not be attributed clearly to either genetic or enviro nmental causes because of limitations of the sampling design.