5029

5(3): Timber trees; Lesser-known timbers

Buchanania Spreng.

Journ. Bot. (Schrader) 2: 234 (1801).

ANACARDIACEAE

x = unknown; 2n = unknown

Buchanania, pink satinwood (En). Brunei: kalan tundang, salingkawang, tengawan. Indonesia: pauhan. Malaysia: kepala tundang (Sabah), otak udang (Peninsular, Sarawak). Papua New Guinea: pink satinwood. Philippines: balinghasai (Filipino).

Buchanania comprises about 25 species occurring from India to Indo-China, southern China, Taiwan, Thailand, the whole of the Malesian region, Australia and the Pacific, east to Samoa. There are 8 species in Malesia.

Buchanania is used for light construction, canoes, furniture, drawers, mouldings, light framing, interior finish, household implements, cigar boxes, turnery articles, veneer and blockboard, and also for pulp and as firewood.
The fruits of some species are edible. Tannin is extracted from the bark of B. arborescens and used for toughening fishing nets. In Peninsular Malaysia the pounded leaves are used as a poultice to treat headache. In Australia B. arborescens is recommended as a shade tree for dry, sunny sites and poor soils.

Small amounts of Buchanania wood are imported by Japan, mainly from Papua New Guinea. In 1996 Papua New Guinea exported a fair amount of about 59 150 m³ of "pink satinwood"" logs at an average free-on-board (FOB) price of US$ 115/m³. In the Philippines pink satinwood probably reaches the market in mixed consignments of lightweight hardwood.

Buchanania yields a lightweight to medium-weight hardwood with a density of (280-)370-640 kg/m³ at 15% moisture content. Heartwood pale grey to pinkish-brown, not clearly differentiated from the pale pink, up to 7 cm wide sapwood; grain straight or shallowly interlocked; texture fine to moderately fine and even; wood slightly lustrous. Growth rings mostly indistinct, rarely distinct due to differences in colour; vessels moderately small to medium-sized, solitary and in radial multiples of 2-3(-4), few in clusters, tyloses few, mostly absent, sometimes with white deposits; parenchyma sparse, paratracheal vasicentric to weakly aliform, visible only with a hand lens; rays extremely fine to moderately fine; ripple marks absent; radial canals sometimes evident.
Shrinkage of the wood is moderate to high, but it seasons well and kiln drying of 25 mm thick boards from green to 12% moisture content takes around 3 days. Boards containing tension wood may distort badly. The wood is moderately soft and fairly weak. It is easy to work with all hand and machine tools and generally can be planed to a good finish. Sawdust may cause dermatitis. The wood is non-durable when exposed to the weather or in contact with the ground. In a graveyard test in the Philippines the wood of B. arborescens lasted for only 7 months. The heartwood is susceptible to dry-wood termites and marine borers. The sapwood is very susceptible to Lyctus. The absorption of preservatives in the heartwood under pressure is variable, the sapwood is permeable.
See also the tables on microscopic wood anatomy and wood properties.

Evergreen, small to fairly large, rarely large trees up to 35(-42) m tall; bole cylindrical, straight, branchless for up to 20 m, up to 100 cm in diameter, sometimes with small buttresses up to 1(-4) m high; bark surface smooth or pock-marked, pale whitish to grey-brown or reddish-brown, inner bark fibrous, reddish-brown or pink, exuding a clear, colourless or pink or greyish gum; crown compact. Leaves arranged spirally, simple, entire, sessile or petiolate, exstipulate. Flowers in an axillary panicle, small, (4-)5(-6)-merous, whitish; calyx lobed, persistent or caducous; stamens twice the number of petals, anthers usually sagittate; disk shallowly cup-shaped, margin dentate; ovary superior, carpels 4-6, connate at the very base only, each with 1 ovule, usually only 1 carpel fertile, style short, stigma oblique, truncate. Fruit a 1-celled drupe with woody or bony stone. Seed with testa free from the endocarp. Seedling with epigeal germination; cotyledons emergent, fleshy; hypocotyl elongated; leaves conduplicate, first pair opposite, subsequent ones arranged spirally.
Flowering is regular, once a year. In Java B. arborescens has been observed with flowers in January-August and with fruits in April-November. In Australia the same species flowers in August and September; in Peninsular Malaysia the main flowering period is from April to June.
For a long time the epithet of B. sessifolia was misspelled as "sessilifolia"".

Buchanania species are found scattered or sometimes gregarious in primary and secondary, lowland rain forest up to 600(-1000) m altitude. In Papua New Guinea they can also be found in lower montane forest up to 1500 m altitude. B. arborescens is a fairly common lower-storey tree of sandy and rocky coasts, kerangas and river banks, but is also found in peat-swamp forest and on limestone hills. B. sessifolia is generally found in well-drained sites but occasionally also in wet locations including freshwater swamps.

Buchanania can be propagated by seed. About 8100 dry fruits/kg have been counted for B. arborescens. Only about 5% of the seeds of B. arborescens germinate in 38-61 days, compared with about 40% in 14-49 days for B. sessifolia. In Java wildlings of B. arborescens have been underplanted in teak plantations to control weed development. Buchanania is not resistant to fire.

There are no records of Buchanania in seed or germplasm banks. It is occasionally found in botanical gardens.

The availability of Buchanania timber and its supply to the market are limited, except in Papua New Guinea. It is unlikely that this situation will change in the near future.

[40]All Nippon Checkers Corporation, 1989. Illustrated commercial foreign woods in Japan. Tokyo. 262 pp.
[125]Bolza, E. & Kloot, N.H., 1966. The mechanical properties of 81 New Guinea timbers. Technological Paper No 41. Division of Forest Products, CSIRO, Melbourne. 39 pp.
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D. Sulistiarini

Buchanania amboinensis
Buchanania arborescens
Buchanania insignis
Buchanania macrocarpa
Buchanania microphylla
Buchanania nitida
Buchanania sessifolia
Buchanania splendens

Sulistiarini, D., 1998. Buchanania Spreng.. In: Sosef, M.S.M., Hong, L.T. and Prawirohatmodjo, S. (Editors): Plant Resources of South-East Asia No 5(3): Timber trees; Lesser-known timbers. PROSEA Foundation, Bogor, Indonesia. Database record: prota4u.org/prosea

The following species in this genus are important in this commodity group and are treated separatedly in this database:
Buchanania amboinensis
Buchanania arborescens
Buchanania insignis
Buchanania macrocarpa
Buchanania microphylla
Buchanania nitida
Buchanania sessifolia
Buchanania splendens