maarten waterloo Thank you for this wonderful explanation ........would you please help me little more on this, if we truly consider it with respect to moisture ​content of the ​tree itself in Oman geographical condition.

Moisture content differs between tree parts with highest levels in the leaves. Most of the biomass is in the stem/root system though. Moisture content is expressed as the fraction of moisture (fresh-dry mass) and oven dry (105 Celsius) matter mass ( is (Mf-Md)/Md *100%). A value of 100% is then equal mass of water to oven dry wood. Most tree species have moisture contents below 100% and this may also decrease with age of the tree. For Prosopis juliflora I found a value of 32.6% at a dry wood density of nearly 900 kg/m3 in Kenya (http://bft.cirad.fr/cd/BFT_298_25-36.pdf). I would think that this value would be similar for P. julifora when grown in Oman. Note that in other fuel wood studies lower moisture contents are cited, but then samples were dried before going into the oven. I hope that this helps...

Published August 13, 2020 19:06 by maarten waterloo, Senior ecohydrologist at Acacia Water

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