IBN AL- HAITHAM J. FO R PURE & APPL. SC I. VO L.24 (1) 2011 Effect of Soil Polluted with Crude Oil on Some Wood Properties of Casuarina equisetifolia B. A. Abd Ali , H. H. Ali Natural History Research Center & Museum university Of Baghdad Received in ,24,Jan,2010 Accepted in , 25, April ,2010 Abstract The current experiment was conducted to explore the effect of soil crude oil ( crude oil ) pollution on some wood properties of Casuarina equisetifolia. Four levels of pollution were applied on 40 (one-year) old seedlings . Measurements were taken by cutting the trees after two growth seasons from date of pollution .The studied Properties were fiber length, diameter, wall thickness, and specific gravity of external and internal wood. Results showed an adverse effect of pollution on fiber diameter more than on fiber length. While wall thickness did not affect. Fiber dimensions of external wood showed higher values than that of internal one, especially for fiber length. Specific gravity was affected by pollution and its interaction. A significant increase in specific gravity was observed with higher pollution levels for external wood only i.e. for the two layers formed after pollution. Introduction Casuarina equisetifolia, is a species belonging to the family Casuarinaceae which has been divided into four genera, viz: Casuarina, Allocasuarina, Gymnostoma, Ceuthostoma [1] . The genus Casuarina contains about 70 species native to the old world tropics [2]. It has the ability to grow on poor sites by enhancing their capacity to form symbiotic root nodules which are capable of fixing atmospheric nitrogen. The nodules contain Actinomycete bacteria thought to belong to the genus Frankia [3]. The same author mentioned that Casuarinas are also known to develop proteoid roots and extensive mycorrhizal associations which probably assist in their nutrition. Egyptians p lanted the trees along the coast to protect houses from the wind and salt spray [4]. C. equisetifolia is tall evergreen tree. It can reach heights of over 30 m. The branches often drooping, sulcate, green, with 6–8 scalelike leaves. Internodes 5–7.5 mm long on the branchlets, only 2.5 mm on main shoots. Main shoots minutely hairy, with small recurved scales about 2.5 mm long, usually 8 in a whorl [4]. They are extremely accepting of salt spray and poor beach soils. Its nut-let fruits ½ in. in diameter embody winged seeds.. Common names are ironwood, beefwood, she oak, and horsetail tree [5] . The wood of Casuarina is dense and very hard, , sp lits easily , and burns slowly with little smoke or ash. It makes an excellent fuel, used particularly in India and China, producing good heat and being relatively smokeless when burnt . C. equisetifolia is reputed to be the best fuel wood species in the world. The appearance of the wood, caused by dark-colored, wide medullary rays, makes it attractive for wood turning and parquetry. The timber is also used for pulp in Philippines and Okinawa, and it is widely grown as a windbreak in southern coastal China and also around citrus groves in Florida [3]. IBN AL- HAITHAM J. FOR PURE & APPL. SCI. VO L.24 (1) 2011 It is well known that soil pollution interrupts physiological processes carried out by plant. The different kinds and levels of pollution could result in different effects on the plant. On the other hand, different plant species don’t have similar responses to pollution. Crude oil pollution have adverse effects on soil fertility and plants production through altering physiological processes and anatomical structures of cells and tissues. Some researchers worked in this field and reported that crude oil sp illage on soil makes it unsatisfactory for plant growth [6 , 7] Iraq as an oil producer country , its soil often exposes to crude oil pollution during oil production, refining, and transportation. C. equisetifolia, as a predominant cultivated species throughout the country and because the foregoing properties of the tree and its wood , it was chosen to be tested under the influence of crude oil pollution. In a previous research, the effect of pollution on the plant growth was studied [8]. During this experiment , wood element properties and specific gravity were selected as a studied factors, since no much works wer done in this direction. Materitls and Methods The experiment was conducted in the experimental area and plant laboratory of Iraq Natural History Research Centre & Museum, Baghdad University , Bab-Almuadham campus, Baghdad. Forty (one-year old) equally length seedling of Casuarina equisetifolia were planted in the field on 5 th of March 2005 in three rows with a distances of one by one meter in clay soil. Planting process was done in the way that the roots of plants had an equal depth from ground surface to assure regularity of treatments. The seedlings were left to grow normally in the field till 4 th of December 2005. Then twenty equally length seedlings were selected to be the units of the experiment . Five levels of crude oil (Basra light crude oil) used ((L0) 0.0, (L1) 0.5, (L2) 1.0, (L3) 2.0 and (L4) 3.0) liter / seedling were added to the soil surface surrounding the plant within a circle of 30 cm diameter. The experiment was conducted by using complete randomized design (C.R.D), the treatments were replicated four times. On the end of December 2007 the experiment was ended by cutting the plants and the effects of crude oil pollution on wood fiber length, diameter, wall thickness and specific gravity of Casuarina equisetifolia were evaluated . Three (1 inch) discs were prepared by cross cutting the stem from lower , middle, and upper part. Each disc was divided radially into two equal parts to assure obtaining of external and internal wood specimens according to their distance from the pith. Small three samples were prepared from each position for testing specific gravity and three others for maceration, these last three were further divided in to small sticks , mixed and a sufficient amount was taken for maceration . Fibers were macerated by glacial acetic acid and hydrogen peroxide . Plants of L4 i.e. 3.o liter / plant could not survive to the end of experiment ,hence they were excluded. Measurements of fiber dimensions were applied on 20 elements for each replicate, i.e. mean value of each level of treatments was represented by 80 measurements . The results obtained were analyzed by using [9]. Results and Discussion Fiber dimensions responded differently to the level of pollution and to specimen position factors and their interaction. Fiber diameter seemed to be the most affected one while wall thickness had no response neither to pollution nor to the position of the specimen (Table 1).Specific gravity was affected by the pollution factor and its interaction with specimen position. IBN AL- HAITHAM J. FO R PURE & APPL. SC I. VO L.24 (1) 2011 Fiber length of wood layers near the bark was much higher than that of layers near the pith (Table 2).The increment was about 18%.The same trend of effect was observed with fiber diameter but lesser than occurred with the fiber length. Similar results were obtained with other tree species [10]. Literature assured such trend of increment especially in juvenile wood [11 , 12]. The effect of pollution on fiber length was not obvious on internal wood, while in case of external wood shorter fibers (except L3) were obtained with higher pollution levels. Also, fibers were narrower with increasing pollution regardless to wood position i.e. the decrement in diameter wsa not limited to the external wood as happened with fiber length. External wood showed thicker fiber than internal one. These values of diameter seems to be not much higher than mentioned in some other literatures, [13], that might be due to the variation in growth conditions. Wall thickness had no significant changes by changing levels of pollution or wood position, that means the increase or decrease in fiber diameter happened mainly in cell lumen affecting wood specific gravity . Results of specific gravity reveal to some interest observations which interpret the significance interaction appeared in table (1). Pollution level had no clear influence on the internal wood specific gravity (Table 3), while very clear effect could be observed on specific gravity of external wood. It was increased with the increase of levels of pollution, especially at the most two higher levels. It means that a higher density was obtained in the wood formed after pollution due to the forming of narrower fibers having the same wall thickness. Herein too, an interest observation was found that the values of specific gravity were at their minimum levels mentioned by literatures dealt with wood of this tree species [2 , 14]. Growth conditions and the size of trees could be the reason of obtaining lower density wood. Some conclusions from the obtained results could be pointed; crude oil pollution has effects on some wood properties . It makes fibers of Casuarina equisetifolia shorter and narrower. Such findings could be explained according to obtaining higher specific gravity of wood for the outer layers that were added after pollution process. References 1-Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. (1992). The families of flowering plants: descriptions, illustrations, identification, and information retrieval. Version: 9th September, 2008. 2-USDA Forest Service (1996 ), Wood Technical Fact Sheet- Casuarina spp ..Forest Prod. Lab. WI 53705 – 2398 . 3- Boland, D.J., Brooker, M.I.H., Chippendale, G.M ., Hall, N., Hyland, B.P.M., Johnston, R.D., Kleinig, D.A.,and Turner, J.D., (1984). "Forest Casuarinas,(CSIRO/Nelson:Melbourne). Trees of Australia Taxonomy. 4-Duke, A. James (1983). Handbook of Energy Crops. Unpublished. Quot. www. Hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/duke-energy/dukeindex.html 5-Larissa Harris,( 2008 ) Exotic Species in Florida, Australian Pine. Report for "Issues in Ecology and Environment in Florida" http://www.floridaplants.com/casuarina_equisetifolia.htm 6-Udo,E.J. and Feyemi, A.A.A. (1975). Effect of oil pollution of soil on germination, growth and nutrient uptake of corn. J. Env. Qual.4: 537-540. 7 - Dejong, E. (1980). The effect of a crude oil spill on cereals. Environ. poll. 22: 187-196 . 8-Ali, H. H. Abd Ali, B. A. (2008). Effects of crude oil on the growth of Casuarina equisetifolia. Scientific Journal of Kerbala University. 6 (4):110-116. 9- Statistica for windows "99 Edition" , 1999 , Kernel release 5.5 A StatSoft, Inc. IBN AL- HAITHAM J. FO R PURE & APPL. SC I. VO L.24 (1) 2011 10-Abd Ali B. A. Ali , H. H., Nasir, F. R. and Ahmed, N. A. (2009). Study of fiber Dimensions and specific gravity of Leucaena leuecocephala growing in the middle of Iraq. Mesopotamia Journal of Agriculture ,. 37 (2) :185-189. 11-Taylor, F. W. (1976). Fiber length variation within growth rings of certain angiosperms. Wood and Fiber Science, 8 (2): 116- 119. 12-Stergios Adamopoulos & Elias Voulgaridis, (2002). Within – tree variation in growth rate and cell dimensions in the wood of black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) IAWA Journal, Vol. 23 (2), 2002: 191–199. 13-Mahmood, A. (1993). Suitability of Casuarina equisetifolia wood for pulp production and paper industry in Pakistan. Pak. J. Bot., 25(2): 179-182, 1993. 14-Hawaii Forest Industry Association (1989). Description of Hawaii s woods.www.studysphere.com/…/Forestry-Forestry Association- 4649.html. Table (1) Analysis of variance of fiber dimensions and specific gravity of the wood of C. equisetifolia Interaction LV x SP Specimen Position ( SP ) Level of Pollution ( LV ) Wood Property Mean Squares df Mean Squares df Mean Squares df 18.74 3 1254.26 * 1 15.24 3 Fiber Length 13.88 * 3 13.20 * 1 11.47 * 3 Fiber Diameter 0.125 3 0.093 1 0.092 3 Wall Thickness 0.0049 * 3 0.0015 1 0.0036 * 3 Specific Gravity Means with (* )are significantly difference ( LSD) at p< 0.05 Table (2) Mean values of wood fiber dimensions of C. equisetifolia as affected by crude oil pollution and position within the stem. Wall Thickness ( μ m) Fiber Diameter ( μ m ) Fiber Length (mm) Level of Pollution External Internal External Internal External Internal 2.54 2.93 22.0 24.6 0.983 0.803 L0 2.93 2.67 24.1 19.4 0.972 0.817 L1 2.43 2.70 22.3 20.1 0.909 0.813 L2 2.80 2.90 20.8 19.2 0.949 0.803 L3 2.68 2.80 22.3 20.8 0.953 0.809 Mean Table (3) Effect of levels of crude oil pollution and specimen position on the specific gravity of C. equisetifolia wood. Mean Specific Gravity Level of Pollution External wood Internal wood 0.522 0.514 0.529 L0 0.511 0.503 0.519 L1 0.528 0.538 0.518 L2 0.545 0.570 0.520 L3 0.527 0.531 0.522 Mean للعلوم الصرفة والتطبیقیة المجلد 2011) 1( 24مجلة ابن الھیثم Casuarina equisetifoliaتأثیر تلوث التربة بالنفط في بعض صفات خشب حسن حسین علي, يباسم عباس عبد عل جامعة بغداد ،ف التاریخ الطبیعيمركز بحوث ومتح 2010،كانون الثاني ،24استلم البحث في 2010، نیسان،25قبل البحث في الخالصة Casuarina أجریت التجربة لبحث تأثیـر تلوث التربـة بالنفط الخـام في بعض صفـات الخشـب لنبـات equisetifolia .تلوث ر . شتلة بعمر سنة واحدة 40على استخدمت أربعة مستویات من ال أخذت النماذج عند قطع األشجا تمت دراسة أطوال األلیاف وأقطارھا وسماكات جدرانھا والوزن النوعي للخشب . بعد موسمي نمو من تأریخ التلوث ولم تبد قطر اللیف بصورة اكبر مما حصل مع طول اللیف، فيأظھرت النتائج تأثیرا عكسیا للتلوث . الداخلي والخارجي ر تأثرا معنویا بھذا العامل السیماظھرت أبعاد األلیاف للخشب الخارجي اكبر من نظیراتھا للخشب الداخلي و. سماكة الجدا تأثر الوزن النوعي للخشب بعامل التلوث متداخال مع العامل اآلخر فقد ظھرت زیادة ملحوظة للوزن . لصفة طول اللیف ظھر بعض . خشب الخارجي دون الداخلي أي للحلقتین اللتین تكونتا بعد عملیة التلوثالنوعي مع ارتفاع مستوى التلوث لل قد یعود سببھ إلى ىالتباین في قیم أبعاد األلیاف والوزن النوعي عما ورد في دراسات أجریت على النوع في مناطق أخر .اختالف الظروف البیئیة للنمو بین المواقع