MEASUREMENT OF THE ENLARGEMENT FORCE AND ENLARGEMENT OF THE ROOT OF CHERRY TREE AS WOODY PLANT

Abstract

Recently, rooftop gardens, wall greening and greening around buildings have increased especially on buildings and infrastructures in urban areas. When we plant contiguously building structures it is necessary to make sure that these are not damaged by the plants, because roots can be a serious external force for building materials. The roots penetrate spaces or weak portions in building materials and then subsequently become enlarged in them. To prevent such damages, it is necessary to know the behavior such as the extent of possible enlargement and the expected enlargement force. An apparatus was therefore developed to characterize the extent of enlargement and the enlargement force of the root. We measured those of the root of the cherry tree in this study. It was found that the root enlarged 0.17 mm in diameter in two months observation and the enlargement force increased to approximately 270 N in three months observation of summer. In addition, it was found that the enlargement force tended to decrease from sunrise to approximately mid-day and increase after mid-day to mid-night because of plant transpiration. In winter the enlargement and enlargement force were slight.