Aquilaria sinensis Seeds | Chinese Agarwood
LATIN NAME: Aquilaria sinensis
COMMON NAME: Chinese Agarwood, Chen Xiang Tree
Plant Profile
The chen xiang tree is an evergreen of ten to twenty metres with leathery oval leaves, a pale grey trunk and small greenish flowers that open at night. It is a member of the Thymelaeaceae, a family better known for fibre and for poison than for timber.
Its native range is the seasonal forest of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan and Fujian, where the old trees were cut out long before anyone counted them. Wild populations are now small enough that the species is treated as threatened in China, and the plantation estate is the main source of legal material. The trunk is pale and slightly fluted at the base, and old trees in Hainan are often hollow, which is the condition the resin trade looks for.
Science & Biotechnology
The tree is pollinated by moths. The flowers open after dark, produce a heavy scent for a single night and drop by morning, and the seed is carried in a fleshy aril that ants take below ground, which is one reason seedlings appear in dense clumps rather than scattered.
Three species dominate the agarwood trade and are routinely confused: Aquilaria sinensis from southern China, A. crassna from Indochina and A. malaccensis from Malesia. They differ in flower size and in the shape of the fruit, not in the wood, and a bale of chips cannot be identified to species without DNA work. That is the practical reason the trade is regulated by weight and by paperwork rather than by inspection.
Uses & Benefits
Plantation wood is sold as chips, as powder and as oil, and the grade depends on resin density: a piece that sinks in water is worth many times one that floats. The named grades of the trade, such as qi nan and ban tou, describe the position and the shape of the resinous part of the tree, not a species or a district.
Beyond incense the tree is planted as a roadside and shade tree in Hainan, and it is one of the species used in reforestation of degraded hill land, since it tolerates poor soil and shade when young. The seed is not edible, and the bark is not used.
Growing from Seed
Sow within two weeks of collection. The aril is removed, the seed is cleaned and sown one centimetre deep in a shaded bed at twenty-five to thirty degrees, and germination takes three to five weeks with a low rate if the seed has dried.
Plant out at one year in light shade, on deep soil with good drainage, and keep the site weed-free for the first three seasons. The tree grows slowly: a trunk of fifteen centimetres takes eight to ten years, and that is the size at which resin induction begins. Frost kills it, and it needs a site with humidity through the dry season.
Our Take
A conservation tree first and a crop second, grown for a resin that only forms after injury. Buy plantation material and ask for the permit.
Related Reading
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