Radial Variability of Selected Physical and Mechanical Parameters of Juvenile Paulownia Wood from Extensive Cultivation in Central Europe—Case Study

Abstract

The research on Paulownia cultivation and wood properties is up to date in many countries. However, there are no data on the properties of this wood defined on a microscale, on microtome samples. The main aim of this study was to find the best valorization path for the wood of Paulownia Shang Tong Hybrid F1 from an extensively cultivated plantation established in April 2017 in Poland by determining the tensile strength, the wood density, the strength-to-density ratio, and the modulus of elasticity on a cross-section of the trunk. The wood was collected from extensive plantation, where production is based on the natural resources of the habitat and ambient weather conditions, which is the opposite to the intensive cultivation model, which is the recommended model of Paulownia cultivation. The results of this study show that the mean density of the analyzed samples was approximately 210 kg/m3 when the mean value of the modulus of elasticity (MOE) was approximately 2400 MPa. The mean result for the tensile strength ratio to density was 11.25 km. In the case of anatomical structure, the increasing trend with age was noticed both in fiber and vessel characteristics. The study results provide unique data worldwide about Paulownia wood’s properties based on a cross-section of the trunk, from plantations cultivated in conditions which are not recommended by seedlings producers. The obtained data indicate that the Paulownia wood (examined) from the cultivation in this study has a technical quality similar to that of model-intensive agricultural plantations.