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Sandalwood (Santalum album) is developing as an important agroforestry crop in Sri Lanka.
The value of S. album depends upon the oil content in
the heartwood and its composition with reference to
sesquiterpene alcohols c/s-a-santalol and c/s-P-santalol. According to the popular belief in Sri Lanka,
certain S. album trees do not produce oil even after
maturity. Therefore the present study was conducted
to identify the presence and the variation of essential
oil, its composition and the variation of growth
parameters of nine distinctive S. album populations
growing under different agroecological zones in Sri
Lanka. According to the results, heartwood content,
oil content and its constituents varied within and
between the populations. It was interesting to observe
that cis-a-santalol and cis-P-santalol were not detected
in certain S. album trees though the oil contents of
those trees were higher than the average. Heartwood
content of the trees did not show a correlation with oil
content, dbh and height. However, the oil content was
significandy correlated with tree dbh and height. Majority of the trees (62 %) had heartwood essential
oil in compliance to ISO standards; only a 31 % of the
total sampled trees had the essential oil content above
2 % (w/w). Dry mountainous Badulla district had the
highest percentage of trees complying the ISO standards. These findings are vital for identifying suitable sources for agroforestry propagation of S. album.
