Variation in hot and cold water soluble extractive content in gymnosperms from Western Himalayas

Abstract

Background: The extractives represent a large number of compounds often of complex chemical structure which can be extracted from wood with the help of polar and non polar solvents. The wood is composed of extractives in the form of organic compounds viz., Fats, waxes, alkaloids and phenols etc. that are soluble in the hot water. Methods: The wood samples of 5 species for the present work were procured from the forest department from 3 locations and further, after oven drying converted into saw dust with the help of Chipper cum grinder. The methodology used for Hot and cold Water Extractives was (T1m-59-Anonymous, 1959a) which was statistically analyzed by using completely block design (factorial) in three replication for each treatment as described by Panse and Sukhatme (1978). Result: The data on hot and cold water extractives content of wood exhibited significant differences for different species and locations. the maximum cold water (6.81%) and hot water (8.70%) extractives were found in Pinus roxburghii while, the minimum cold water (4.77%) and hot water (6.50%) extractives were observed in Picea smithiana. Significant variation has been observed for hot and cold water soluble extractives between different species due to variation in composition of extractives from species to species and the total amount of extractives in a given species depends on growth conditions. Values for hot water soluble extractives are higher than those of cold water. The difference in solubility is due to hydrolysis and corresponding increase in solubility of wood substance during the boiling with water.