Tropical evergreen forests (or tropical rain forests) are usually found in areas receiving more than 234 cm of rainfall and having a monthly mean temperature of 18 °C or higher in the coldest months. They occupy about seven percent of the Earth's surface and harbour more than half of the planet's terrestrial plants and animals. Tropical evergreen forests are dense, multi-layered, and harbour many types of plants and animals. These forest are found in the areas receiving heavy rainfall (more than 200 cm annual rainfall). They are very dense. Even the sunlight does not reach the ground. Numerous species of trees are found in these forests. Different types of trees shed there leaves at different times of the year. Therefore, these forests always appear green and are known as evergreen forests. These forests are found in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, along the slopes of Western Ghats and parts of Northeastern states of Assam, West Bengal and Odisha. These areas experience hot and humid climate with short dry season. The important trees of these forests are rosewood, ebony and mahogany.
Characteristics
Wonderful Nature: Amazing Evergreen Forest - These woods were filmed in the Bohemian Switzerland in the Czech Republic. Truly amazing for hikes...
The trees are evergreen as there is no period of drought or frost. The canopy tree species are mostly tall hardwoods with broad leaves that release large quantities of water through transpiration, in a cycle that is important in raising as much mineral nutrient material as possible from the soil. They do not shed their leaves at a time and therefore always remain green and are called evergreen forest. Here, the trees are 60 m in height (196 ft) and the rainfall is between 150 cm to 300 cm.
Species of trees
Coniferous temperate evergreen forests are most frequently dominated by species in the families Pinaceae and Cupressaceae. Broadleaf temperate evergreen forests include those in which Fagaceae, such as oaks, are common, those in which Nothofagaceae predominate, and the Eucalyptus forests of the Southern Hemisphere. There also are assorted temperate evergreen forests dominated by other families of trees, such as Lauraceae in laurel forest.
Regions
Temperate evergreen forests, coniferous, broad leaf, and mixed, are found largely in the temperate mid-latitudes of North America, Siberia, Canada, Australia, Africa, Scandinavia, Himalayas and western ghats of India. Broadleaf evergreen forests occur in particular in southern China, southeastern Brazil, parts of southeastern North America and the Pacific Northwest, and in countries around the Mediterranean Basin, such as Lebanon and Morocco. Other examples include the wet temperate conifer forests of northwestern North America.
See also
- Deciduous forest
- Biomes
- Ecoregion
- Ecological land classification
- List of terrestrial ecoregions (WWF)
- *Temperate coniferous forest
References
External links
- Tropical Evergreen Forests
