Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The lighter-colored and softer part of the wood of exogenous plants, between the inner bark and the heart-wood.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Bot.) The white and softer part of wood, between the inner bark and the hard wood or duramen; sapwood.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun
sapwood ; the thin white layer between the bark and wood of a tree
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Incisions are made into the alburnum of the seringueiras; below the wound small pots are attached, which twenty-four hours suffice to fill with a milky sap.
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Wood is composed of duramen or heartwood, and alburnum or sapwood, and when dry consists approximately of 49 per cent by weight of carbon, 6 per cent of hydrogen, 44 per cent of oxygen, and 1 per cent of ash, which is fairly uniform for all species.
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Because it is formed by branches of those returning vessels that deposit the new alburnum.
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 19, No. 529, January 14, 1832 Various
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The growth of the trunk or stem of all exogenous plants, or those which increase in size on the outside of the stem, is brought about by the descent of certain formative tissue called cambium, elaborated by the leaves and descending between the old wood and the bark, where it is formed into alburnum or woody matter.
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This consists in cutting a ring round the tree with axes through the bark and sapwood, or alburnum, into the brown wood beneath.
Australia, The Dairy Country Australia. Dept. of External Affairs
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When he saw that Madame Delmare was obliged to make an effort to listen to him, he held his peace, and naught could be heard save the innumerable little voices whispering in the burning wood, the plaintive song of the log as it becomes heated and swells, the crackling of the bark as it curls before breaking, and the faint phosphorescent explosions of the alburnum, which emits a bluish flame.
Indiana 1900
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The giant's heart had disappeared, the alburnum had been dissipated into soft whitish dust; but if the tree did not depend so much on its powerful roots as on its solid bark, it could still keep its position for centuries.
Godfrey Morgan A Californian Mystery Jules Verne 1866
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The tree was evidently hollow throughout its length; but perhaps some portion of the alburnum still remained intact.
Godfrey Morgan A Californian Mystery Jules Verne 1866
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Incisions are made into the alburnum of the seringueiras; below the wound small pots are attached, which twenty-four hours suffice to fill with a milky sap.
Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon Jules Verne 1866
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It was probably an effect of the season, for Knight states that he never could discover the least trace of saccharine matter during winter in the alburnum either of the stem or of the roots of the sycamore.
jaime_d commented on the word alburnum
the sapwood (newer, softer wood between the heartwood and the bark)
from Thoreau's A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
July 19, 2009
bilby commented on the word alburnum
Compare laburnum.
July 19, 2009