Question

What is wood botanically ? Differentiate hard and soft wood.

Answer 1

A complex secondary tissue, formed due to secondary growth, found mainly in the stems of gymnosperms and angiosperms is called wood. It is composed of secondary xylem formed by the vascular cambium during secondary growth.

	Soft wood	Hard wood
1.	lacks wood fibres	abundant wood fibres present
2.	non-porous wood as it lacks vessels	porous wood as vessels are present
3.	composed of nearly 90-95% tracheids	composed of only 5-10% tracheids
4.	found in gymnosperms	found in angiosperms