Acacia melanoxylon R.Brown: a study of the relationship height-diameter

摘要

In the hills of Azul (Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina) populations of Acacia melanoxylon R.Brown are spread spontaneously. Although diffusion mechanisms are unknown, it is supposed that these populations derive from exotic cultivated trees introduced in the gardens and ornamental woods in the first decades of XX~(th) century. As the Acacia wood has excellent characteristics for industrial applications, it is important to carry out a characterisation of the resource that determines the volume of wood that is found in this area at present. The use of alometric equations that allow the determination of the adjustment degree between the individual total height and the diameter at breast height (D.B.H.), will allow for the utilisation of one of these variables as a predictor of the other. In this paper a study of the relation height - diameter (D.B.H.) of an Acacia melanoxylon R.Brown population was carried out. Initially a conventional adjustment methodology by means of a lineal regression, and the search of a non-lineal equation using statistical programmes in the SPSS and SPLUS markets was applied. In a second stage a new methodology is applied through which a family of mainly non-lineal equations can be obtained and an implicit equation that improves the approximation and the adjustment obtained by SPSS and SPLUS programmes can be selected.