Hardness is commonly used to determine the suitability of a timber species for flooring applications. In this study, Janka hardness test is conducted on sawlog managed Eucalyptus nitens and regrowth forest Eucalyptus obliqua sourced from Tasmania, Australia. Plantation E. nitens timber is currently entering the Australian market and the feasibility of using this fast grown species in value added applications such as timber flooring is advantageous. Further to testing Janka hardness on solid timber samples, a regime of engineered timber flooring prototypes consisting of plantation E. nitens top layers, veneers and solid densified E. nitens boards were developed and subjected to Janka hardness test. The results were compared against solid E. obliqua flooring and a commercially available engineered flooring product with Tasmanian Oak top layer. The results showed that Janka hardness of plantation grown E. nitens, and E. obliqua currently available in the market are lower than the values published in the literature. This indicates that the material properties of fast grown plantation timber and regrowth forest material are different to the native forest timber properties published decades earlier. Furthermore, some of the tested engineered flooring prototypes showed similar behaviour to timber flooring products currently in market, suggesting that E. nitens engineered flooring would be suitable for domestic/light commercial flooring applications despite the general conception of unsuitability due to lower densities.

Abrasion resistance is an important property for the functional performance and serviceability of timber floors. Although hardness is the conventional criterion used in selecting species for flooring applications, it shows greater variations and restricts the use of low-density species, whereas abrasion resistance could generate a more reliable indication of a product’s surface performance. Eucalyptus nitens is a fast-grown global plantation species extensively available in Tasmania, Australia. Until recently, this material has been perceived as unsuitable for appearance applications such as flooring. This study assesses several engineered flooring prototypes comprised of E. nitens—sawlog managed and fibre-managed resources—compared to an existing market product (E. obliqua and a commercial engineered timber flooring product with UV-cured coating). Tests were performed in accordance with the EN 14354:2016, sandpaper method using Taber abraser and further modified to test flooring prototypes. The highest abrasion resistance was observed in the E. nitens veneer composite product. Fibre-managed E. nitens resulted in the greatest level of abrasion, while sawlog-managed E. nitens was comparable to native regrowth E. obliqua, a commonly used flooring species historically used in Australia. Therefore, the findings from this research suggest there are suitable flooring applications for plantation E. nitens as engineered wood products in some domestic and residential dwellings when compared to existing native products.

Due to the increasing demand and market price established for its valuable fragrant essentialoil produced in the heartwood, Santalum album is subjected to over-exploitation for a longperiod in Sri Lanka. Since it is a hemi-parasitic tree which has the ability of absorbing certainnutrients from other host tree species via root connections, a comprehensive understanding ofS. album-host relationship is of major importance in both commercial and conservationperspectives.Therefore, the present study was conducted to determine the ability of supplying nitrogen,phosphorous, potassium and magnesium to young S. album plants by different host species. AS. album-host trial plantation located in Balangoda of Rathnapura District belonging to WM3agro-ecological zone was used for this purpose. This trial consisted of 20 differentcombinations of two hosts of Sesbenia grandiflora, Gliricidia sepium, Grevillea robusta,Calliandra calothyrus, Erythrina variegate, Acacia auriculiformis and Coffea arabica per S.album. Leaf samples from S. album plants were collected for five times, from November2012 to October 2014. Total nitrogen content was determined using Micro-Kjeldhal methodwhile the potassium and magnesium levels were determined using atomic absorptionspectroscopy for the collected leaves. Phosphorous content was analysed by colourimetricdetermination using a spectrophotometer.According to the results, G. sepium/S. grandiflora host combination provided the highestnitrogen content. Two G. robusta plants provided the highest potassium level while the hostcombination of G. sepium/G. robusta provided the highest phosphorous content for S. album.The highest magnesium content was observed in the combination with two G. sepium plants.However, One-way ANOVA did not indicate any significant difference for the testednutrients in S. album leaves.Keywords: Santalum album, Host species, Leaf nutrients, Haustorial connections