Allometry for estimating above ground biomass of Eucalyptus tereticornis under energy and boundary plantations in Central India

Eighty-six trees of Eucalyptus tereticornis (forty from energy and forty six from boundary plantation) were harvested to develop allometric regression equation for predicting standing tree's above ground weight. Diameter of trees ranged from 9.55 to 30.25 cm and 12.73 to 37.58 cm, biomass from 25.95 to 332.48 and 69.34 to 777.76 kg, and height from 11.7 to 29.35 and 10.80 to 25.40 m under energy and boundary plantations, respectively. It was interesting to observe that leaf biomass accumulation was almost same under both plantations, whereas bole biomass was slightly higher under energy plantations than boundary plantation, although statistically differences were not significant. Non-linear functions were fitted to the observed data and thoroughly evaluated through residual diagnostic which revealed that the allometric equations: Biomass = 0.264 × (dbh) 2.173 and Biomass = 0.421 × (dbh) 1.976 were statistically valid for a wide range of dbh (1-40 cm) under energy and boundary plantations, respectively for semi-arid conditions and may be used for estimation of plant biomass from dbh measurements in permanent study sites where destructive sampling is not possible.