Biomass Production and Rooting Behaviour of Eucalyptus tereticornis Sm. on Deep Soils and Riverbed Bouldery Lands of Doon Valley, India

Above and below ground biomass production was estimated for Eucalyptus tereticornis Sm. Stands growing on deep textured soils and riverbed bouldery lands of Doon Valley. Above ground biomass production was 23.30 t ha^-1 On the deep soils and 20.83 t ha^-1 On the riverbed lands, while below ground production on these two sites was 7.51 t ha^-1 and 11.04 t ha^-1 Respectively. On the deep soils, 8.7% of total stand dry matter production was in fine ischolar_mains, in contrast to over 26% on the riverbed lands. However, the difference in total biomass production between the two sites was small (1.06 t ha^-1 ). The ischolar_main characteristics viz., depth, number, lateral spread, weight and percentage ischolar_mains in soils at the two sites were studied. It was observed that the development of the main ischolar_main is largely dependent on soil type. In deep heavy textured soil, Eucalyptus developed a sparsely branched and deeply penetrating ischolar_main system, while in riverbed bouldery lands a more compact intensively branched ischolar_main system was recorded. In riverbed bouldery lands due to presence of impediments, coiling of ischolar_mains was observed. A relationship between vertical ischolar_main length and total ischolar_main length to be known as "Coiling Factor" was established to compare coiling of ischolar_mains under different soil working depths.