Forest Improvement

Our goal is to produce quality timber and for that to happen, we need to pay special attention to the genetics of our trees. A commercial forest without genetic improvement is a forest without increase in productivity, and to pursue this leap in production we have a program of cloning and sexual breeding. Everything started with the selection of mother trees in conserved forest areas. The seeds from these trees originated our commercial plantations and our improvement populations. Today, we can select and multiply the best trees in our mini clonal garden and breed the best individuals in our improvement populations to produce superior seeds.

Sexual Breeding

The company has Base Populations for improvement and a genetic reserve of more than fifteen species, among them Jequitibá Rosa (Cariniana legalis), Jacarandá da Bahia (Dalbergia nigra) and Ipês (Handroanthus sp.), icons of the Brazilian forests.

Starting from Base Populations composed of dozens of families from diverse origins, the characteristics of these populations will be monitored to identify superior individuals, progenies and provenances to obtain genetic information from the populations or set of materials.

Symbiosis’ genetic improvement program will continuously produce improved materials that will feed the company's plantations, focusing on the species health, volumetric gain (height and diameter), form and quality of the wood, collecting, setting and perpetuating new favorable gene combinations.

Cloning

hrough the cloning achieved by vegetative propagation techniques, such as cutting, grafting and micropropagation, it is possible to leverage the desirable characteristics of superior individuals, selecting and multiplying them until new individuals from the improvement programs stand out.

With this in mind, Symbiosis has a mini clonal garden structure and a greenhouse for rooting cuttings. The idea is to test cloning by minicutting the species of interest, which already occurs in an experimental manner, testing the spacing, foliar architecture, nutritional demands, cutting productivity and rooting.